September 27th, 2009 @ kadraoui // No Comments
September 27th, 2009 @ kadraoui // No Comments
TYPHOON TERROR
MANILA: Sixty people were killed, Manila was blacked out and airline flights were suspended as a powerful typhoon battered the main Philippines island of Luzon yesterday.
Television showed houses swept away by swollen rivers, people on rooftops waving for help and throngs stranded along Manila’s submerged main streets as the storm packing winds of 100kmph dumped six months’ rain in one day.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo appealed for donations of clothes, blankets, food and water as hundreds of families, perched on rooftops or trapped in submerged areas, waited for rescue.
Forty-seven people were killed, mostly by drowning, in Rizal province, east of Manila. Eleven people were killed by collapsing walls and rising flood waters in the capital area.
Authorities shut down operations at international and domestic airports, stranding thousands of passengers. An advisory said operations would not resume until today. Businesses and commercial shops closed early and hotels were packed by weary commuters.
Disaster officials declared a “state of calamity” for the capital region and 25 other areas on the main island of Luzon.
The typhoon was moving west-northwest and was expected to head towards the South China Sea by today evening or tomorrow morning.
Chief weather forecaster Nathaniel Cruz said the typhoon brought the heaviest rainfall in the country since 1967 after its weather station collected 341mm of rainfall in just six hours yesterday.