DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 22 February)—An unattended carton box, suspected as a bomb threat, temporarily disrupted operations at the Davao City Overland Transport Terminal (DCOTT) early morning Thursday.
Photo courtesy of the Davao City Police Office
As it turned out, it was just a box containing limestone and sand endorsed by a customer to the bus driver to be brought to Manila during the trip for a small fee, to be picked up by someone there. But the consignee wasn’t able to claim it, and thus the baggage went all the way back to Davao City.
A spot report sent to MindaNews early morning said that around 6:45 a.m. Thursday, K-9 handler Dante Nolasco’s dog sniffed an unattended carton box found inside a Philtranco bus with number 8888, prompting him to report it to Central 911 and the Ecoland Police Station.
In a radio interview with local station DXDC, Captain Ronnie Batingal, Ecoland Police Station deputy chief, said they temporarily closed the bus terminal for security reasons.
During the initial investigation, Rey Enrique Cristuta, bus driver of the Philtranco, said he was told by a certain Kenneth Maglasang that the box must be delivered to Manila on January 21. But it was reportedly not delivered because the Manila-based consignee from Zheng Xin Hardware had not claimed it in Manila.
Batingal said that the consignee was apparently not available when the bus arrived in Manila.[]
But then the bus had to return to Davao in two days, and the consignee became available only after the bus had left, he added.[]
