Tropical Storm 22W (Hagupit), # 12: Manila may get spared

By Dave Ornauer

Stars and Stripes

10:30 p.m. Monday, Dec. 8, Philippines time: Hagupit continues to deteriorate and it appears as if Manila and the former Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Station may be spared the worst of what remains of what is now a middling tropical storm. Observers on the ground say rain has been consistently light, though that may change, with 15-mph sustained winds and occasional gusts. Always best to prepare for worse, because any tropical cyclone's eastern quadrants possess more moisture and higher winds.

Joint Typhoon Warning Center projected Hagupit to pass 54 miles south of Manila at 11 p.m., 90 miles south of Clark at 5 a.m. Tuesday and 58 miles south of Subic at 7 a.m. Sustained winds at its center are 52 mph with 63-mph gusts.

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8 December 2014 Last updated at 12:54

Typhoon Hagupit: Storm weakens as it nears Philippine capital Manila

Tropical storm Hagupit is heading to Manila, but has been downgraded from a typhoon after crossing the country.

At least 21 people were killed by the storm, the Red Cross said, with the eastern island of Samar worst hit, but it caused far less damage than feared.

Thousands of people are heading home after about a million people were evacuated from vulnerable areas.

The city of Tacloban, which bore the brunt of Super Typhoon Haiyan last year, has emerged relatively unscathed.

At the scene: Saira Asher, BBC News, Albay province

Albay province, which evacuated more than half its population, has called for those people to go home.

After spending three days at a school in Polangi, families are packing into small military trucks, holding one or two plastic bags with the essentials they brought with them.

They worry about the state in which they'll find their homes but many are most worried about their rice fields, their only source of income.

One woman reached her house and found it flooded and uninhabitable. For her that means at least one more night in the evacuation centre.

Hagupit: What did the Philippines do differently?

Hagiput - pictures, tweets and videos from the Philippines

In the capital, residents are preparing for heavy rain and strong winds.

The typhoon is still travelling westwards across the Philippines, and has weakened into a tropical storm, according to the Philippine meteorological authorities.

A government alert on Monday morning stated that residents of the capital and surrounding regions should expect winds of up to 100km/h (62mph) in the next 24 hours, and to prepare for possible flash floods, landslides, and storm surges of up to 2m.

Thousands who live along the coast and riverbanks were evacuated on Monday, reports said. A total of 11.8 million people live in the national capital region.

Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada said the city was "prepared and trained for this", but added: "It's the flooding that we are worried about."

Financial markets closed their doors on Monday along with schools and government offices. Flights and other public transport were halted.

Hagupit has been nowhere near as powerful as Typhoon Haiyan - known as Yolanda in the Philippines - which tore through the central Philippines in November 2013, leaving more than 7,000 dead or missing.

In Tacloban, Hagupit blew away roofs and flooded streets, but the area has escaped the wider devastation of last year.

"There were no bodies scattered on the road, no big mounds of debris," local woman Rhea Estuna told the Associated Press by phone from Tacloban. "Thanks to God this typhoon wasn't as violent."

Tacloban Mayor Alfred Romualdez told the BBC that the immediate task was assessing damage to the temporary shelters in which some people have been living.

He said that the weather was good now but that high tides were making it harder for waterways to drain, despite work to clear debris.

UN official Orla Fagan told Reuters that a lot of people have begun returning to their homes. "In Tacloban this morning, the sun is shining, people just started going back," she said.

The storm made its fourth landfall on Monday night, hitting Batangas province some 100km (60 miles) south of Manila with winds of roughly 100km/h.

At its height, as it approached land on Saturday, gusts of up to 250km/h were recorded.

The authorities said they were better prepared than when Haiyan struck, and organised the largest peacetime evacuation in the history of the Philippines.

Justin Morgan, Oxfam country director for the Philippines, told the BBC that a key factor was a greater focus on the dangers of storm surges, meaning people were moved away from coastal areas.

Joey Salceda, governor of Albay province, told the BBC no casualties and only "negligible damage" had been reported in his province.

He said the storm had been identified as a threat in late November, giving officials time to identify population at risk, evacuate them two days ahead of the storm and prepare food supplies.

Known locally as Typhoon Ruby, Hagupit has nonetheless caused major damage in several towns in the east.

The Philippine Red Cross said at least 21 people had died over the weekend, with 18 of those on the eastern island of Samar, where Hagupit made landfall on Saturday.

The mayor of Dolores, a town on Samar, said that 80% of homes there had been destroyed. One resident reportedly died after a tree fell on him.

Two more people - a one-year-old girl and a 65-year-old man - died from hypothermia in the central province of Iloilo, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council said.

A total of 183 flights had been cancelled and five airports closed, the agency said, and there were power outages in 16 provinces.

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8 December 2014 Last updated at 12:47

Typhoon Hagupit: What did the Philippines do differently?

By Saira Asher BBC News, Legazpi

For the hundreds of families who took shelter from Typhoon Hagupit inside a school in Albay province, the wait is finally over.

Today they find out what state their homes and fields are in after days inside a strong building to protect them from the powerful gusts of winds and endless rain.

"I hope that our house wasn't destroyed or damaged by [the] typhoon or that it was not in the flood," says 16-year-old Ronna Mae Salturio.

Her family, one of many living in small shanties along the road, is getting ready to be taken home in a military truck with the few essentials they brought with them.

They might be worried about their future, but they have survived.

At least 21 people are known to have died during Hagupit, but that's a stark comparison with last year when more than 7,000 died or went missing from Typhoon Haiyan which left mass destruction in its wake.

There are still remote parts of Samar that are unreachable, due to floods or downed trees blocking roads, and there could be significant destruction and loss of life there.

But for the most part, the Philippines looks to have averted disaster on a national scale.

For some, it shows the government has learned its lesson and preparations were made in time.

President Benigno Aquino's administration faced much criticism for the slow response in getting food and aid to Tacloban and other areas after Haiyan.

In the Philippines, where bad weather is a part of life, Albay province is seen as a leading example of disaster management. In 1995, it set up a separate office solely to deal with emergencies and it looks to have paid off.

A total of 128,998 families were evacuated from low lying or mudslide-prone areas to schools, community centres and other stronger buildings, with the help of trucks and personnel from the military.

The governor told the BBC he went on the radio to encourage people to leave their homes and property behind.

They were also given incentives in the form of bags of rice, which for those living in poverty is a big draw.

It's all part of what the provincial government says was its strategy to minimise risk and loss of life.

"Evacuation rather than rescue, that's our doctrine," says Cedric Daep, Chief of the Albay Public Safety and Emergency Management Office.

He says they met days before the expected typhoon with local mayors to identify the major hazards. Floods, landslides, storm surges, mud flow and strong winds could destroy houses made of light materials.

Haiyan was so deadly largely because of the huge unexpected storm surges it brought with it which wiped away entire communities.

So knowing that, evacuating from low lying areas looks to have paid off.

"We are happy with the result that we achieved zero casualty," Mr Daep says.

And at the national level, food and aid distribution centres were set up early. Both the government and aid agencies were poised to act before the storm this time as opposed to reacting after.

President Aquino said before the typhoon struck that he would not be patient with excuses after this event and wanted to set a "zero casualty" target.

They also had help from the fact that Hagupit turned out to be much less destructive then predicted.

It was briefly classed as a super typhoon as it approached the Philippines, with winds of 250km/h, but by the time it hit land on Saturday it had reduced in speed significantly.

But even then, it was increased awareness of the dangers of the typhoon that made people nervous enough to leave their homes.

That fear is the legacy that Haiyan has left here.

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9Dec 2014

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Tropical Storm 22W (Hagupit), # 14: Hagupit exits Philippine

By Dave Ornauer

Stars and Stripes

11:30 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 9, Philippines time: Tropical Storm Hagupit has begun tracking southwest away from the west coast of the Philippines into the South China Sea. Joint Typhoon Warning Center’s latest forecast shows Hagupit packing 46-mph sustained winds and 58-mph gusts at its center, and it has passed closest point of approach to Metro Manila, Clark Free Economic Zone and Subic Bay Free Port.

At least 27 people were killed during Hagupit, 21 on eastern Samar Island alone, Philippine government and Red Cross officials told CNN and Reuters. Some 1,000 homes were destroyed, more than 1 million were evacuated from their homes, the storm downed trees and caused flooding in low-lying areas.

But the lessons of Super Typhoon Haiyan, which devastated many of the same areas 13 months ago, were apparently learned well, officials said. About half the population of Tacloban, the city hardest hit by Haiyan last year, evacuated to safer ground, the U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA Philippines told CNN.

“People didn’t have to be pushed any more,” Philippines Red Cross chairman Richard Gordon told CNN, mindful of efforts to evacuate large numbers of people from vulnerable east coastal areas, averting a repeat of last year’s disaster in which more than 7,000 died. “They knew they could face another Haiyan, and Haiyan killed a lot of people from storm surges.”

While wind associated with Hagupit was far less and storm surges less evident than with Haiyan, Hagupit was a far slower-moving storm, which meant the big worry was heavy rain and flooding, much of which occurred in eastern Samar and other islands south and east of Manila.

Some 25 million reside in Metro Manila and surrounding areas, but the capital only received just over an inch of rain and winds between 15 and 20 mph. Areas south and east got hit much harder and saw as much as 17 inches of rain in Catbalogan, on Samar island.

Assessment teams have already fanned out to Samar to survey damage, Reuters reported. Philippines armed forces chief Gen. Gregorio Catapang said local authorities were working with international groups. Officials have said 11 countries have pledged to send aid. Australia has pledged 800 metric tons of rice to people affected by Hagupit. Senior government officials have inspected Dolores, on Samar, where Hagupit made initial landfall, and saw damaged homes, fallen trees and posts blocking roads and villagers holding out in evacuation centers, Reuters reported.

Philippines president Benigno Aquino canceled a trip to Korea for the ASEAN summit this week to stay at home and work with officials to help the country recover from Hagupit, Aquino’s spokeswoman told Reuters.

Hagupit is now on a southwestern course toward Vietnam, and is forecast by JTWC to make landfall at 7 a.m. local time Friday as a tropical depression, about 80 miles northeast of Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon). Unless Hagupit regenerates over the South China Sea and becomes more of a threat to Vietnam, this is the final report on Hagupit, which at one time was the eighth super typhoon of the northwest Pacific’s season.

 

8 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 9, Philippines time: The worst appears to be over wind-wise for Metro Manila and surrounding areas, but the threat of heavy rain associated with Tropical Storm Hagupit continues, as it remains a slow-moving storm, grinding west-northwest at just over 5 mph, packing 46-mph sustained winds and 52-mph gusts at its center.

Hagupit made its closest point of approach about 55 miles south of Manila at 1 a.m. Tuesday, 83 miles south of the former Clark Air Base some three hours later and 52 miles south of the former Subic Bay Naval Station at about 8 a.m. Manila was still experiencing sustained 15-mph winds at 8 a.m., but rain remains in the forecast into late Tuesday and possibly Wednesday. Wind warnings of between 19 to 38 mph remain in effect for Metro Manila south to Mindoro and several provinces inbetween, the Weather Channel reported.

While Manila had received just over an inch of rain through early Tuesday, forecast calls for between 3 to 5 inches as Hagupit continues slowly moving west. Most heavy rain was concentrated south and east of the capital since last Friday. Catbalogan, on the eastern island of Samar where Hagupit first made landfall, got the most recorded rainfall, 17½ inches. Tabayas, just southeast of Manila, received 10.72 inches of rain. More than 25 people have perished and more than 1 million people have been evacuated, according to various reports.

Hagupit should continue moving west out over the South China Sea toward Vietnam, making landfall there as a tropical depression late Thursday or early Friday.

 

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HAGUPIT WEAKENS INTO TROPICAL DEPRESSION

Dec 09, 2014

Hagupit, local name Ruby, further weakens into a tropical depression Tuesday. This comes after state weather bureau PAGASA downgraded Hagupit into a tropical storm Monday night. PAGASA also lowered all storm signals, but areas in Southern Luzon, including Metro Manila, will still experience rain. Hagupit is expected to leave Luzon Thursday.

The National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council or NDRRMC says Hagupit, which started out a super typhoon, killed at least 11 and affected over 2 million people. The Philippine Red Cross earlier reported 21 died but the NDRRMC said the number was unverified. The Agriculture Department pegs the crop damage at almost P500 million. Government statistics show over 1 million people were housed in evacuation centers the night the storm made landfall.

The United Nations Office for Disaster Reduction calls the preemptive evacuation “one of the largest peacetime evacuations in Philippine history.” This is a far cry from the estimated 125,000 evacuated for Super Typhoon Haiyan or Yolanda.

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Ruby: Areas under State of Calamity

Published 3:13 PM, Dec 10, 2014

List of provinces, cities, and municipalities under a state of calamity due to Typhoon Ruby (Hagupit)

SEEKING SHELTER. Leyte residents seek shelter in churches, schools, and evacuation centers as Typhoon Ruby approaches. Photo by Vincent Go/Rappler

This list will be regularly updated. Please refresh this page for updates.

MANILA, Philippines (UPDATED) – This is a list of provinces, cities, and municipalities that have declared a state of calamity due to Typhoon Ruby (Hagupit) as of Monday, December 8.

LUZON

• Albay
• Camarines Sur
• Masbate
• Catanduanes
• San Pablo City, Laguna

VISAYAS

• Pilar, Capiz
• Cebu
• Aklan

The declaration of a state of calamity helps facilitate release of emergency funds for use in a disaster or emergency.

A local government will also be allowed to freeze princes for basic commodities, grant zero interest loans, import foreign donations, and give hazard allowances for health workers and emergency responders. – Rappler.com

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Disturbing climate change

Rappler talks to Fr. Jett Villarin on Typhoon Ruby, and the UN climate change talks in Lima

Published 2:39 PM, Dec 10, 2014

Updated 2:44 PM, Dec 10, 2014

MANILA, Philippines - Rappler talks to Fr. Jett Villarin, one of the Filipino authors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Reports and the president of Ateneo de Manila University.

As the 20th United Nations Climate Change Conference (#COP20) at Lima comes to a close, the Philippines reels from the effects of Typhoon Ruby. Ruby (international name: Hagupit) is the latest among a slew of typhoons that battered the country in 2014. The National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council says Ruby, which started out a super typhoon, killed at least 11 and affected over 2 million people in Eastern Visayas and Central Luzon.

In Lima, negotiators debate over a UN pact to curb global warming and the politics of climate change action. Should rich, developed nations commit to more responsibility in decreasing greenhouse gas emissions? What will the future look like if climate change progresses at its current pace?

With the Philippines topping a list of countries most affected by climate change in 2013, the discussion on climate change becomes more and more significant. The Philippines ranks number one in the Global Climate Risk Index 2015, a list of countries most affected by weather-related disasters like storms, floods, and heatwaves. Cambodia ranks 2nd, and India places 3rd. Last year, Typhoon Haiyan ravaged the Visayas and left more than 6,300 dead.

Is worsening climate change inevitable? Will the typhoons be worse in 2015? What does climate change resiliency mean? How does the government address the knowledge gap on climate change?