The Philippines evacuated hundreds of thousands of people and confirmed at least three deaths on Friday as it faced yet another tropical storm, days after it was battered by deadly Super Typhoon Ragasa.
Civil defence officials in the Bicol region in the south of Luzon island said three people were killed when walls collapsed and trees were uprooted by Severe Tropical Storm Bualoi, which is sweeping west by northwest at sustained speeds of 110 kilometres (70 miles) per hour.
Evacuees in one province took cover under pews as the roof of a church where they were sheltering was ripped apart by the storm.
Jerome Martinez, a municipal engineer in southern Luzon’s Masbate province, told AFP that the wind destroyed the door, windows and ceiling of the church at around 4:00 am.
“That’s one of the strongest winds I’ve ever experienced,” Martinez said, adding some children had suffered minor injuries requiring stitches.
“I think more people will have to evacuate still because many houses were destroyed and many roofs were blown away. They are now blocking the streets and roads,” he said.
Government officials also raised the death toll from Super Typhoon Ragasa, which swept across the northern Philippines this week on its way to China, to 14, with thousands still displaced.
Ragasa also killed at least 14 people in Taiwan, and left 22 missing, after its torrential rains caused a barrier lake to burst.
Philippine civil defence official Bernardo Alejandro told a news briefing that 400,000 people had been evacuated nationwide in the face of the new tropical storm.
“We are clearing many big trees and toppled electric posts because many roads are impassable,” Frandell Anthony Abellera, a rescuer in Bicol’s Masbate City, told AFP by phone.
“The rain was strong, but the wind was stronger.”
The Philippine weather service said Severe Tropical Storm Bualoi could regain typhoon status as it moved back out over the South China Sea early Saturday.
-Public anger-
Videos shared on social media and verified by AFP showed people using boats or trudging through waist-deep water to navigate flooded streets further south in the central Philippines’ Visayas islands.
Five fishermen were also missing in the Visayas after setting sail on Tuesday, according to coast guard station commander Kean Gaco, who said strong waves made an immediate search impossible.
“It is expected that there will still be strong rains in the coming hours,” government weather specialist Benison J. Estareja said.
Further west, Oriental Mindoro province governor Humerlito Dolor said “the entire roof” of the province’s sports complex had been ripped off by Bualoi’s winds.
The Philippines is hit by an average of 20 storms and typhoons each year, routinely striking disaster-prone areas where millions of people live in poverty.
Scientists warn that storms are becoming more powerful as the world warms due to the effects of human-driven climate change.
Authorities warned on Thursday of a “high risk of life-threatening storm surge” of up to three meters (10 feet) with the coming storm.
The storms come as the Philippine public seethes over a scandal involving bogus flood-control projects believed to have cost taxpayers billions of dollars.
Thousands took to the streets on Sunday to vent their anger, with the peaceful demonstrations later overshadowed by street battles that saw police vehicles set ablaze and the windows of a precinct headquarters shattered.
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© Agence France-Presse
