One of the strongest storms on record slammed into the central Philippines, killing more than 100 people whose bodies lay in the streets of one of the hardest-hit cities, an official said Saturday.
Capt. John Andrews, deputy director general of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, said more than 100 others were injured in the city of Tacloban on Leyte Island, where Typhoon Haiyan hit Friday.
With power and most communications knocked out a day after the typhoon ravaged the central region, Andrew told The Associated Press that the information about the deaths was relayed to him by his staff in Tacloban.
“The information is reliable,” he said.
Nearly 750,000 people were forced to flee their homes and damage was believed to be extensive.
Weather officials said ‘Yolanda’ had sustained winds of 235 kph (147 mph) with gusts of 275 kph (170 mph) when it made landfall. By those measurements, Haiyan would be comparable to a strong Category 4 hurricane in the U.S., nearly in the top category, a 5.
According to reports by the military, fatalities from the fury of ‘Yolanda’ where “too many” in Tacloban City in Leyte.
Armed Forces Central Command spokesman Lt. Jim Alagao said on Saturday that based on field reports from soldiers there, there were “too many” bodies scattered along the streets.
“We don’t have numbers yet but it’s many,”Alagao told
INQUIRER.net in Filipino.
Alagao also said the troops were having a hard time to retrieve bodies because of fallen trees and posts that blocked the roads.
He said the city was described by the soldiers as “a total devastation” and that the soldiers in Tacloban City have already started their clearing operations and relief efforts.
Alagao said they were relying on military radios as of the moment to communicate with their troops there.
But in Samar, another area which was directly hit by ‘Yolanda,’ Alagao said they could not establish contact even through military radio.
Because of cut-off communications in the Philippines, it was impossible to know the full extent of casualties and damage. Officially, four people were listed as dead as of Saturday morning, before the latest information from Tacloban came in.
Southern Leyte Gov. Roger Mercado said the typhoon ripped roofs off houses and triggered landslides that blocked roads.
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 told The Associated Press by telephone, 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.”
Eduardo del Rosario, head of the disaster response agency, said the speed at which the typhoon sliced through the central islands — 40 kph (25 mph) — helped prevent its 600-kilometer (375-mile) band of rain clouds from dumping enough of their load to overflow waterways. Flooding from heavy rains is often the main cause of deaths from typhoons.
“It has helped that the typhoon blew very fast in terms of preventing lots of casualties,” regional military commander Lt. Gen. Roy Deveraturda said. He said the massive evacuation of villagers before the storm also saved many lives.
As of early Saturday, Yolanda was over West Philippine Sea and is expected to exit the Philippine area of responsibility in the afternoon.
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