Six members of a family died in a fire that razed their house in Barangay Pasong Tamo in Quezon City early Saturday, according to the Bureau of Fire Protection.
The fire reportedly broke out at 1:54 a.m. in the residential area and was extinguished by 3:20 a.m., BFP investigators said.
Firemen said the dead were a 79-year-old man, a 30-year-old woman, and her three children, aged 12, seven, and two.
It was yet to be determined at press time the relationship of the sixth fatality with the other victims.
By 6:30 a.m., five bodies were recovered with the last retrieved much later.
Arson probers surmised that the victims tried but failed to escape from their burning house based on the locations where their bodies were found.
Two bodies were found on the ground floor, two on the stairs (the mother and baby) and two minors were discovered on the second floor.
While most of the bodies were charred, firemen said the victims may have succumbed to suffocation.
Damage to properties was estimated at P1.5 million.