By Roy Ramos
ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines
More than 70 people have been confirmed dead while several others remain unaccounted for after a fire broke out at a footwear factory in a suburb of the Philippines’ capital.
Sr. Superintendent Sergio Soriano Jr. of the Philippines' fire bureau told local radio station DZBB that the number of bodies recovered from the building in Valenzuela city, Metro Manila, had risen to 72 Thursday.
His comments came an hour after Mayor Rex Gachalian was cited in a Twitter post on radio announcer Allan Gatus’ account as saying 55 bodies had been recovered as of 11.45 a.m. (0445GMT), with some 30 others injured.
"We're apologizing if there are any discrepancy, but this is the best that we're doing," Gatchalian told a press conference.
"Because we'll have to understand, some of families [of those trapped] registered twice,” he added. “Sometimes a brother or sister would come to register, sometimes the father would come again."
Various figures have been reported on the number of people in the factory at the time of the accident Wednesday since the logbook had burnt and officials conducted a manual count by gathering relatives at a help desk.
Firemen and other rescue teams continue to scour the scene of fire, which was reportedly extinguished in less than an hour Wednesday evening.
Wednesday's factory blaze came as the second deadliest in recent history in terms of casualties. A fire that razed Ozone Disco Club in Quezon City on March 17, 1996 is considered the most deadly with 162 deaths.
On Nov. 20 last year, nine men -- seven former safety officials and two businessmen – were sentenced to between six and 10 years in jail on charges relating to the Ozone club fire.
An estimated 400 people, mostly high school and college students celebrating the end of the academic year, were inside the building when the fire broke out. Many of the blackened bodies were found piled waist-high in a corridor leading to the only exit.
The high death toll was attributed to the building’s structural faults and lack of fire safety measures at the disco, which had passed city inspections.
The blaze highlighted the issue of lax safety regulation in a country where fatal building fires are common.
