Berliner Boersenzeitung - Thousands flee as Typhoon Usagi hits north Philippines

EUR -
AED 3.878381
AFN 70.7463
ALL 97.61914
AMD 408.610835
ANG 1.902881
AOA 962.990181
ARS 1056.133675
AUD 1.629831
AWG 1.903279
AZN 1.782367
BAM 1.961169
BBD 2.131736
BDT 126.165379
BGN 1.956257
BHD 0.39792
BIF 3059.500854
BMD 1.055911
BND 1.420876
BOB 7.295109
BRL 6.101267
BSD 1.05579
BTN 89.111243
BWP 14.492536
BYN 3.455159
BYR 20695.847018
BZD 2.128166
CAD 1.481395
CDF 3026.239678
CHF 0.937438
CLF 0.037319
CLP 1029.755569
CNY 7.634553
CNH 7.648657
COP 4732.327162
CRC 539.276272
CUC 1.055911
CUP 27.98163
CVE 110.765732
CZK 25.288741
DJF 187.656729
DKK 7.458477
DOP 63.830097
DZD 141.090833
EGP 52.228289
ERN 15.838658
ETB 128.873835
FJD 2.402218
FKP 0.833448
GBP 0.831266
GEL 2.877311
GGP 0.833448
GHS 16.947137
GIP 0.833448
GMD 74.96988
GNF 9113.563672
GTQ 8.153629
GYD 220.880478
HKD 8.217001
HNL 26.461494
HRK 7.532084
HTG 138.728456
HUF 406.280067
IDR 16819.863322
ILS 3.949333
IMP 0.833448
INR 89.184477
IQD 1383.770792
IRR 44459.114242
ISK 145.704916
JEP 0.833448
JMD 167.13754
JOD 0.74875
JPY 164.483941
KES 136.746848
KGS 91.20586
KHR 4277.493968
KMF 492.577276
KPW 950.319106
KRW 1481.96991
KWD 0.324608
KYD 0.879792
KZT 523.432901
LAK 23171.957081
LBP 94609.586688
LKR 308.454396
LRD 194.389971
LSL 19.270249
LTL 3.117829
LVL 0.63871
LYD 5.142547
MAD 10.51481
MDL 19.124993
MGA 4915.2638
MKD 61.493876
MMK 3429.556317
MNT 3587.984033
MOP 8.463609
MRU 42.104426
MUR 49.828585
MVR 16.313496
MWK 1833.060651
MXN 21.60902
MYR 4.731009
MZN 67.474328
NAD 19.270822
NGN 1773.781857
NIO 38.836002
NOK 11.721563
NPR 142.583725
NZD 1.797172
OMR 0.406548
PAB 1.05581
PEN 4.017209
PGK 4.154744
PHP 62.147202
PKR 293.595921
PLN 4.324907
PYG 8245.572309
QAR 3.844095
RON 4.976081
RSD 116.819612
RUB 104.856145
RWF 1441.317917
SAR 3.96598
SBD 8.852284
SCR 14.358481
SDG 635.128609
SEK 11.567089
SGD 1.418188
SHP 0.833448
SLE 23.948042
SLL 22141.921534
SOS 603.457557
SRD 37.333301
STD 21855.216762
SVC 9.23829
SYP 2653.006815
SZL 19.270107
THB 36.819919
TJS 11.254396
TMT 3.706246
TND 3.328196
TOP 2.473047
TRY 36.246349
TTD 7.168624
TWD 34.401037
TZS 2808.722543
UAH 43.524448
UGX 3874.606762
USD 1.055911
UYU 44.852785
UZS 13542.052761
VES 47.509864
VND 26820.128279
VUV 125.359824
WST 2.94767
XAF 657.745123
XAG 0.034607
XAU 0.00041
XCD 2.853651
XDR 0.79537
XOF 650.970195
XPF 119.331742
YER 263.819195
ZAR 19.211538
ZMK 9504.459219
ZMW 28.954812
ZWL 340.00277
  • RIO

    -0.1500

    60.47

    -0.25%

  • CMSC

    0.0490

    24.659

    +0.2%

  • BTI

    0.2100

    35.63

    +0.59%

  • SCS

    -0.1650

    13.205

    -1.25%

  • CMSD

    -0.0200

    24.71

    -0.08%

  • BCC

    -2.5200

    140.03

    -1.8%

  • BCE

    -0.2700

    26.94

    -1%

  • NGG

    0.5900

    62.71

    +0.94%

  • RBGPF

    -0.9400

    59.25

    -1.59%

  • JRI

    -0.0100

    13.23

    -0.08%

  • RYCEF

    -0.2300

    6.88

    -3.34%

  • BP

    0.4600

    29.03

    +1.58%

  • GSK

    -0.0150

    35.095

    -0.04%

  • AZN

    0.6000

    65.89

    +0.91%

  • VOD

    -0.0250

    8.725

    -0.29%

  • RELX

    0.0450

    46.165

    +0.1%

Thousands flee as Typhoon Usagi hits north Philippines
Thousands flee as Typhoon Usagi hits north Philippines / Photo: Handout - Philippine Coast Guard (PCG)/AFP

Thousands flee as Typhoon Usagi hits north Philippines

Typhoon Usagi slammed into the Philippines' already disaster-ravaged north on Thursday, as authorities rushed to evacuate thousands of people from flood-prone areas.

Text size:

The fifth storm to strike the country in just three weeks, Usagi made landfall in the town of Baggao in Cagayan province at 0530 GMT, packing winds of 175 kilometres (109 miles) an hour, the national weather service said.

The brutal wave of weather disasters has already killed 159 people and prompted the United Nations to request $32.9 million in aid for the worst-affected regions.

The national weather agency had initially raised its highest storm alert, but downgraded to its second-highest as Usagi made landfall.

It weakened to 165 kilometres an hour as it ploughed north to the municipality of Gonzaga and open waters beyond it.

Baggao police said no casualties or substantial damage were immediately reported, while 28 residents of a village were evacuated amid concern it would get flooded.

"It was weaker than we expected," a relieved police officer, Karen Ibarra, told AFP by phone.

President Ferdinand Marcos, visiting storm-affected areas to dole out emergency cash aid, urged residents to comply with evacuation orders.

"We know that it is difficult to leave your homes and possessions, but sheltering could save lives," he told residents of Mindoro island south of the capital Manila, according to an official transcript of his speech.

"While we cannot prevent typhoons from hitting the country, we can take steps to reduce their impact," he said, calling for better infrastructure to cope with worsening storm effects he blamed on climate change.

- 'Forced evacuations' -

Elsewhere in Cagayan, officials worked in driving rain Thursday to evacuate residents along the coasts and on the banks of already swollen rivers.

"Yesterday it was preemptive evacuations. Now we're doing forced evacuations," local disaster official Edward Gaspar told AFP by phone hours before landfall, adding 1,404 residents were sheltering at a municipal gym in Gonzaga.

Cagayan's civil defence chief Rueli Rapsing said he expected local governments to take 40,000 people to shelters, roughly the same number that were removed from their homes ahead of Typhoon Yinxing earlier this month.

He said more than 5,000 Cagayan residents were still in shelters following the previous storms because the Cagayan river, the country's largest, remained swollen from heavy rain that fell in several provinces upstream.

- Overlapping typhoons -

After Usagi, Severe Tropical Storm Man-yi is forecast to strike the densely-populated capital Manila on Sunday.

This was similar to the path of last month's Severe Tropical Storm Trami, which accounted for most of the deaths tallied in the recent swarm of weather disasters to hit the country.

Local officials were ordered to convince residents of flood- and landslide-prone communities in Man-yi's path to move to shelters on Friday ahead of its landfall, the civil defence office said.

"Typhoons are overlapping. As soon as communities attempt to recover from the shock, the next tropical storm is already hitting them again," said Gustavo Gonzalez, the UN's humanitarian coordinator in the Philippines.

"In this context, the response capacity gets exhausted and budgets depleted."

A UN assessment of the past month's weather disasters said 207,000 houses had been damaged or destroyed, and nearly 700,000 people were seeking temporary shelter.

Many families were without even essentials like sleeping mats, hygiene kits, and cooking supplies, and had limited access to safe drinking water, it said.

The storms destroyed thousands of hectares of farmland and persistent flooding is likely to delay replanting efforts and worsen food supply problems, the report added.

About 20 big storms and typhoons hit the archipelago nation or its surrounding waters each year, killing scores of people and keeping millions in enduring poverty.

A recent study showed that storms in the Asia-Pacific region are increasingly forming closer to coastlines, intensifying more rapidly and lasting longer over land due to climate change.

(P.Werner--BBZ)