KORONADAL CITY - The Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) in South Cotabato has established three substations to further improve its quick response in the province.
Senior Fire Officer 1 Phillip Chan, a representative of the BFP-South Cotabato, said Wednesday in a press conference of the 11 local government units in the province, three have already activated their fire substations.
“We already have sub-stations in the town of Surallah. In the municipality of Polomolok, aside from the substation in Barangay Cannery, the construction for another substation is ongoing in Barangay Glamang. Koronadal has a sub-station at the city’s public terminal,” Chan said.
He said the substations were established in strategic areas so that fires in all areas within the municipality or city will be responded to on time.
“We have what we call response time, supposedly BFP personnel can respond to fire incidents at the span of five to seven minutes within five to seven-kilometer radius,” Chan said.
He added that as of now, the BFP-South Cotabato has 290 firefighters, 211 of them are males and 79 are females.
“They are distributed throughout South Cotabato fire stations,” Chan said.
He admitted that the lack of personnel is a perennial problem of all BFP units in the country, but stressed that their main headquarters is doing their best to address the problem. (PNA)