The Philippines issued its highest storm alert and evacuated thousands of people on Thursday, 14th November, 2024 as Super Typhoon Ofel barrelled towards it’s disaster prone north.
The winds surged of up to 180 kilometers an hour. Ofel is expected to smash onto the main island of Luzon in the afternoon local time — the fifth storm to threaten the country in just three weeks.
The brutal wave of weather disturbances 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 said the winds could cause “almost total damage to structures of light materials, especially in highly exposed coastal areas”, and “heavy damage” to buildings otherwise considered “low risk”.
“Intense to torrential rain” and potentially “life threatening” coastal waves of up to three meters were also forecast over two days, with the storm warning raised to the highest signal on a five step scale.
“Evacuations are ongoing” in coastal and low-lying areas of Cagayan province, its civil defense chief Rueli Rapsing told AFP.
He said more than 5,000 Cagayan residents were still in shelters following the previous storms.
After Ofel, Tropical Storm Man-yi is also forecast to strike the Philippines’ population heartland around the capital Manila this weekend.
“Typhoons are overlapping. As soon as communities attempt to recover from the shock, the next tropical storm is already hitting them again,” UN Philippines Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator Gustavo Gonzalez said.
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.
