A man searches among the debris of his destroyed house near Tacloban Airport, on the eastern island of Leyte, in the Philippines.(Photo: Noel Celis, AFP/Getty Images)
Story Highlights
Nearly 800,000 people flee their homes in Philippines
Death toll expected to rise
More than 500,000 evacuated from high-risk areas in Vietnam
Super Typhoon Haiyan, among the most powerful storms ever recorded, crashed across the central islands of the Philippines Friday, killing more than 100 people and forcing nearly 800,000 people to flee their homes before heading west toward Vietnam.
More than 100 others were injured in the city of Tacloban on Leyte Island, Capt. John Andrews, deputy director general of the Civil Aviation Authority, said.
Regional military commander Lt. Gen. Roy Deveraturda said that the casualty figure “probably will increase,” after viewing aerial photographs of the widespread devastation caused by the typhoon.
Initial reports on Philippine television are that dozens of bodies are visible in public areas in Leyte, one of the hardest hit islands, along with Samar and Bohol.
The Philippine television station GMA reported its news team saw 11 bodies, including that of a child, washed ashore Friday and 20 more bodies at a pier in Tacloban hours after the typhoon ripped through the coastal city.
At least 20 more bodies were taken to a church in nearby Palo town that was used as an evacuation center but had to be abandoned when its roofs were blown away, the TV network reported.
There were reports of widespread power outages, flash flood, landslides and scores of buildings that were torn apart. Andrews said civil aviation authorities in Tacloban reported that the seaside airport terminal was “ruined” by storm surges, though military planes were still able to land with relief aid.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement that America stood ready to help.
Because communications in the Philippines were cut-off, it remained difficult to determine the full extent of casualties and damage.
Last SlideNext Slide
“We expect the level of destruction caused by Typhoon Haiyan to be extensive and devastating, and sadly we fear that many lives will be lost,” said Anna Lindenfors, Philippines director of Save the Children.
“With this magnitude we know that the destruction is overwhelming,” said Emma Amores, who is waiting outside Villamor Airbase in Manila, where a C-130 is loading relief supplies and personnel heading to hard-hit Tacloban. “From the images we saw on TV, it’s highly likely our houses are gone. We just want to know that the family are all safe.”
Romil Elinsuv, who is in Manila for work training, worried about his wife and 4-year-old son who are at their home in Palo, a town in the province of Leyte.
“I feel fear. I don’t know what the situation is there,” Elinsuv said. He said he spoke with his wife the day before. She assured him they were OK, but then the line went dead and he’s been unable to reach her since.
Haiyan’s sustained winds weakened Saturday to 101 mph. The center of the storm was moving away from the Philippines and into the South China Sea, but high winds were still battering the country. It was expected to make landfall Sunday morning in central Vietnam, with winds of about 125 mph, which is the strength of a Category 3 hurricane. Vietnamese authorities in four central provinces began evacuating more than 500,000 people from high risk areas to government buildings, schools and other concrete homes able to withstand strong winds.
“The evacuation is being conducted with urgency and must be completed before 5 p.m.,” disaster official Nguyen Thi Yen Linh by telephone from central Danang City, where some 76,000 are being moved to safety.
Hundreds of thousands of others were being taken to shelters in the provinces of Quang Ngai, Quang Nam and Thua Thien Hue. Schools were closed and two deputy prime ministers were sent to the region to direct the preparations.
Haiyan, known as Yolanda in the typhoon-prone Philippines, affected a huge sweep of the country. At least two people were electrocuted in storm-related accidents, one person was killed by a fallen tree and another was struck by lightning, official reports said.
Southern Leyte Gov. Roger Mercado said the typhoon triggered landslides that blocked roads, uprooted trees and ripped roofs off houses around his residence.
The dense clouds and heavy rains made the day seem almost as dark as night, he said.
“When you’re faced with such a scenario, you can only pray, and pray and pray,” Mercado said in a telephone interview, adding that mayors in the province had not called in to report any major damage.
“I hope that means they were spared and not the other way around,” he said. “My worst fear is there will be massive loss of lives and property.”
STORY: Typhoon Haiyan: 3 things to watch
The category-5 storm made landfall Friday morning at Guiuan, a small city in Samar province in the eastern Philippines.
Houses destroyed by Typhoon Haiyan in Tacloban, on the eastern island of Leyte in the Philippines.(Photo: Noel Celis, AFP/Getty)
Over 12 million people live in the storm’s path, including Cebu City, with a population of about 2.5 million, and Bohol island, where a major earthquake last month killed over 200 people and left thousands homeless and highly vulnerable in tents. By Saturday afternoon local time, an estimated 4 million people were affected by the typhoon, AP reported.
President Benigno Aquino said Thursday his administration had made war-like preparations, with air force planes, helicopters and navy ships on standby. Over one million people fled their homes ahead of the storm as the government announced evacuation plans in many areas. With at least 20 typhoons hitting the Philippines every year, its people are familiar with nature’s power, but none have experienced what some meteorologists have called the most powerful typhoon ever to make landfall.
The affected areas include islands loved by travelers around the world. Last month, Conde Nast Traveler magazine named Cebu and Bohol in its list of the Top 5 Islands in Asia. In Cebu city Friday evening, the wind and rain had eased, electricity had been restored and residents were emerging to assess the damage, said Sarah Adlawan, a saleswoman at the Cebu Northwinds Hotel.
Haiyan was be the fourth typhoon to hit the Philippines this year and the third Category 5 typhoon to make landfall in the Philippines since 2010, says meteorologist Jeff Masters of the Weather Underground. Just last year, Super Typhoon Bopha killed more than 1,900 people in the Philippines when it hit on Dec. 3, the deadliest typhoon in Philippine history.
“The Philippines lie in the most tropical cyclone-prone waters on Earth, and rarely escape a year without experiencing a devastating typhoon,” says Masters A tropical cyclone is an all-encompassing term that includes typhoons, hurricanes, and cyclones, which have different names depending on where they form.
Filipino children ride bicycles through floodwaters in the city of Taguig.(Photo: Francis R. Malasig, EPA)
Since 1970, the Philippines has been hit by more tropical cyclones than any country on earth, except for China, according to the National Hurricane Center.
On average, about 30 tropical cyclones form in the western Pacific Ocean each year, the Joint Typhoon Warning Center reports. According to data from the warning center, an October record of seven typhoons developed in the western Pacific Ocean last month.
That doesn’t include Cyclone Phailin, which became the strongest system to make landfall in India since 1999, coming ashore in the eastern state of Odisha in October, killing at least 44 people. Storms that form in the Indian Ocean – a separate “basin” from the Western Pacific — are known as cyclones.
Rowena Pinky Jumamoy, a member of the Filipino Association in Richmond, Va. (FAACV) and a native of Inabang, Bohol, one of the provinces hit the hardest by Haiyan, made contact with Tian Cempron, a conservation fellow of the marine sanctuary project. “As of this morning, the news is that In one coastal village alone at least 30 houses were wiped out,” Jumamoy said.
Imelda Hofmeister, of Oshkosh, Wis., spent Friday morning on the phone with family in Illinois that had reached her parents in Lianga, a southern Filipino city in Surigao del Sur. They were spared from the typhoon’s path, but still had not had any contact from family further north in Tacloban, Cebu and Ormoc which were harder hit.
Typhoon Haiyan strikes the Philippines on Nov. 8, 2013.(Photo: NOAA)
“We haven’t heard anything – good or bad news from our cousins. Normally we let the family know that status through Facebook messages and we know that my parents and immediate family is OK,” Hofmeister said. “But further north and we know there will be a ton of damage since most of the houses are built so close to the water.”
Though she hoped her family is physically safe, Hofmeister said the lightweight pole buildings and tin roofs are not built to sustain the winds that hit the islands.
“I checked into our hotel with my family Thursday night as we live by the coast, and were worried because we heard on the radio this would be the strongest ever typhoon,” she said. “The winds did not feel too strong today, but I have no idea if my home is okay,” said Adlawan, who planned to return there Friday night.
“The government was well-prepared for this typhoon and informed the people,” so many could evacuate low-lying areas, she said. “Thank God, all my family are okay.”
In this strongly Catholic country, clergy nationwide have been praying to reduce the storm’s expected devastation. Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma, also the president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, asked bishops and priests to lead the people in praying the Oratio Imperata, or Obligatory Prayer, used when calamity threatens.
It paid off, said Hildren Mallete, receptionist at the Casablanca Hotel in Legazpi City, Albay province. While Legazpi suffered a blackout early Friday morning, the wind and rain were not as strong as residents had feared, said Mallete. “The priests have been saying prayers from yesterday to today, and that helped our city. The power of prayer, it helped a lot.”
Contributing: Sunshine de Leon reporting from Manila; Korina Lopez, Michael Winter USA TODAY; Nick Penzenstadler, The Post-Crescent in Appleton WI.; Associated Press.
Source Article from http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/11/09/typhoon-haiyan-philippines-vietnam/3483099/