Houses and buildings destroyed in blaze

JAKARTA (JP): A large blaze gutted a two-story abandoned restaurant, a four-story office block and two houses on Jl. H. Juanda in Central Jakarta yesterday afternoon.

No fatalities were reported but material losses were estimated to be hundreds of billions of rupiah.

A short circuit was believed to have sparked the fire which started at 2 p.m. in the kitchen of the La Fonda restaurant, Freddy Alling, head of the Central Jakarta Fire Department, said.

"But it's still conjecture and we will investigate it further," he said.

At least 14 fire-fighting crews were dispatched to the scene, which is less than one kilometer from Bina Graha Presidential Office.

Freddy said he had initially deployed eight crews but 10 minutes later strong winds began fanning the fire so he was forced to send more personnel.

The firefighters were able to extinguish the blaze within an hour using water from nearby Ciliwung River.

Susanto, owner of PT Sarang Tekhnik, an irrigation contractor and a distributor for Hitachi products, said that parts of the company office were damaged by fire. He refused to estimate material losses.

Susanto said the office was empty when the fire occurred.

"Thank God my staff were all on Christmas holidays until Monday," he said.

The two residential houses gutted in the fire were located behind the company's office.

Karti, 56, a maid in one of the houses, said: "I was sitting alone inside the house when the fire started."

She said it was lucky that her ailing 85-year-old female employer was visiting her son.

Karti said she only had enough time to pack two bags with clothes and some money. She was in such a panic that she did not think about saving her employers' belongings.

Her next-door neighbor, Marsandi, said: "I was waiting on the veranda for my grandchild to return from school when I heard some kids yelling 'fire, fire'."

She rushed inside the house to turn off the electricity and told her son to move his car out of the garage. (04)