Fire at Padangpanjang mayor's office
Fire at Padangpanjang mayor's office
Kasparman
The Jakarta Post
Padangpanjang
Fire destroyed parts of the Padangpanjang mayor's office on Jl.
Sutan Sjahrir in Padangpanjang, West Sumatra, early Friday
morning, paralyzing the office's activities for the whole day, a
report said.
The fire, which gutted a number of rooms, excluding those of
the mayor's and the city secretary's, and destroyed office
equipment and incinerated all documents inside, occurred at 3
a.m.
Witnesses said the incident was first spotted by a motorist
passing in front of the office. He then blew his horn to wake up
the office's guards.
Five fire engines, which were sent to the site from
Padangpanjang and neighboring Bukittinggi municipality and Tanah
Datar regency, had difficulty putting out the blaze. The distance
from the fire department's offices to the mayor's office and
strong winds contributed to the firefighters' difficulty in
extinguishing the fire.
Padangpanjang Mayor Johannes Tamin told reporters later in the
day that the fire destroyed the rooms of the office's legal
affairs department, administrative affairs department, social
affairs department, general affairs department, economic affairs
department and treasury department, while dozens of computers
were destroyed.
"There was nothing we could remove from the burning rooms ...
The fire happened so suddenly," Tamin said, adding that his
office had yet to calculate the losses, including the petty cash
kept in the safe.
There is no information available on when the office's
employees will resume work, pending the mayor's decision on an
alternative building to be temporarily used to provide services
to the public.
"The only available and usable space is the office's meeting
hall," the mayor said.
Chief of the East Padangpanjang Police substation First Insp.
Rustam Bima said the police had not yet determined the cause of
the fire.
"We're still questioning the two security guards on duty last
night -- Hasan Basri and Epi," Bima said on Friday.