‘Learn from Yolanda, heed calls to evacuate’
MALACAÑANG yesterday sounded the alarm on areas expected to be hit by another potentially devastating storm, saying residents should heed calls to evacuate.
Government forecasters said typhoon Hagupit, which was packing sustained winds of 195 kilometers per hour and gusts of up to 230 kph, may hit Eastern Samar province on Saturday and barrel inland along the same route where supertyphoon Yolanda leveled villages and left more than 6,300 dead and missing in November last year.
President Aquino yesterday led an emergency meeting of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council and ordered steps to prevent panic-buying and hoarding of goods.
The approaching typhoon “presents a challenge but, I think, we’ve been challenged worse by Yolanda,” Aquino told officials during the nationally televised meeting
While warning villagers about the danger, the President urged officials to avoid causing unnecessary alarm.
Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma reiterated the government’s “aspiration” to have “zero casualty” hours before typhoon Ruby is expected to barrel through central Philippines.
“We appeal to our people to immediately follow warnings and cooperate in the measures being implemented by the different government agencies,” he told reporters.
“To those living in areas where there is preemptive evacuation, let’s not wait for the actual danger to come before moving. Delaying evacuation from low-lying areas could endanger our people and hold up help from government and citizen volunteers.”
Coloma said the government “does not want lives to be wasted just because of the absence of preparedness and because [people] didn’t take warnings seriously.”
Coloma said the government learned its lessons after Yolanda, the strongest storm on record which killed more than 6,300 people in Eastern Visayas in 2013.
“I am sure that we learned our lessons based on our experience with typhoon Yolanda and at present, the government is doing everything needed to ensure the safety of our people,” he said.
The last time the “zero-casualty” goal was achieved was last July when Albay recorded no deaths during the onslaught of typhoon Glenda.
Residents of coastal areas in many parts of Eastern Visayas yesterday started fleeing their homes and sparked panic-buying in grocery stores and gas stations as the approaching storm brought back horrors of Yolanda.
Emily Sagales said many of her still-edgy neighbors in Tacloban City packed their clothes and fled to a sports stadium and safer homes of relatives. Long lines formed at grocery stores and gas stations as residents hoarded basic goods, she said. “The trauma has returned,” said the 23-year-old Sagales who lost her mother-in-law and gave birth to a baby girl in a crowded makeshift clinic near the Tacloban airport.
Hotels in Tacloban, which barely recovered from the massive damage, were running out of rooms as wealthier families booked ahead for the weekend. “The sun is still shining but people are obviously scared. Almost all of our rooms have been booked,” said Roan
Florendo of the Leyte Park hotel, which lies near San Pedro Bay in Tacloban.
The government put the military on full alert, workers opened evacuation centers and transported food packs to far-flung villages, which could be cut off by heavy rains.
With the typhoon still over 1,600 kilometers off northeastern Mindanao, the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) yesterday allowed interisland vessels to ply their routes in Southern Tagalog, Bicol, the Visayas and Mindanao.
Coast guard spokesman Cmdr. Armand Balilo said it was “still okay” for them to sail, as of Thursday.
However, he said small seacraft and fishing boats were “no longer allowed to go offshore due to strong to gale force wind warnings” issued by the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services (Pagasa).
Vice Admiral Rodolfo Isorena, the Coast Guard commandant, reminded fishermen about the “safety precautions they are expected to observe” during weather disturbances. He advised them “not to challenge the typhoon,” stressing “we don’t want a repeat of Pablo and Yolanda.”
Pablo whose international code name was Bopha, devastated parts of Mindanao in early December 2012. /Inquirer and AP