ZAMBOANGA CITY, 21 December 2003 — Landslides and floods caused by days of heavy rains have killed at least 70 people and many more missing and feared dead in the central and southern Philippines, officials said yesterday.
Governor Rosette Lerias of Southern Leyte province said 13 people were confirmed dead in San Francisco town and 83 others missing since late Friday. Eighty houses were buried, and more than 250 people were rescued, she said.
In nearby Liloan town, five people were killed in landslides and floods while 17 others were buried in debris and feared dead, Lerias said. “There are landslides all over the province,” she said. “It has been raining for several days and the ground has become so saturated.”
“Many cadavers are still scattered in the villages worst hit by flashfloods and landslides,” Lerias added.
Military chief Gen. Narciso Abaya sent troops to the two coastal towns in the island of Panaon to help in search and rescue operations.
Soldiers were already sent to the disaster areas. We are doing our best to save more lives,” Abaya told the Arab News.
Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman held out hope that those missing may have sought shelter elsewhere to escape the landslides.
Allen Olayvar, coordinator of the Office of Civil Defense in Southern Leyte, said provincial officials received cell phone text messages early yesterday reporting the casualties. “Emergency!” one text message said. “There are so many dead from landslide here ... Please inform the governor to get help here.”
Liloan and San Francisco are on a small island off the southern tip of the main Leyte island, about 660 kilometers (412 miles) southeast of Manila.
Lerias, reached by telephone in Liloan, north of San Francisco, said the bodies of nine of 19 people buried in landslides have been recovered.
She added that 50 people were missing after huge Pacific Ocean waves battered three coastal villages in San Ricardo, on the east side of the island.
Antonio Maamo, vice mayor of Liloan town, quoted survivors as saying that late at night they heard a thundering sound coming down the mountains, and a few minutes later a torrent of mud covered their houses.
Residents panicked and fled for high ground but had difficulty navigating in the darkness, said Teresita Orano, one of the survivors who lost a child in the disaster.
Maamo said three houses in his town were completely buried.
Getting help for those affected was made more difficult because the avalanche had washed out some bridges, preventing heavy equipment from being brought in, the vice-mayor complained. Rescuers were forced to dig using hand tools like shovels and iron bars, Maamo said.
Soldiers were trying to reach San Francisco on foot after landslides blocked roads, low clouds prevented helicopters from taking off in nearby Sogod town and high waves forced rescue boats to turn back, officials said.
In the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, nine people, including two infants, were killed in separate landslides in Surigao city, said Lorene Sia, duty officer at the regional civil defense office. Sia said six others were reported missing and six more injured, including a 5-year-old girl.
She said three people drowned in the flood in Agusan del Sur province and one person was missing.
At least 5,260 people were evacuated from rising floodwaters that damaged more than 220 houses and destroyed 62 in the northeastern Mindanao region close to Southern Leyte, she said.
The rains began Monday in eastern parts of the central Philippines and Mindanao, and continued throughout yesterday.
Lerias said it was the worst rains that hit the province in many years. She said authorities reported many landslides in the province, but could not say how many people were affected. “Many roads are unpassable and many bridges have been destroyed by rampaging floodwaters and debris. The soil is eroded because of the non-stop rains,” she said.
Police said many villagers were buried alive in Liloan town. “We are doing everything to find any survivors,” a police officer Eulalio Duazo said.
Lerias on yesterday appealed by phone on a radio network DZRH in Manila for food and medicines to the devastated towns.
On Friday, a passenger ship carrying at least 275 people, ran aground on a coral bed off Nasipit town in the southern province of Agusan, although, there were no reports of injuries or casualties, said coast guard spokesman Lt. Armand Balilo.
He said the boat MV Princess of Paradise was maneuvering a channel entrance off the Nasipit port when it hit a bed of coral. The boat left the Manila harbor on Wednesday and was on its way to Agusan del Sur province and Cagayan de Oro City when the accident occurred.
