Villagers in northern Philippine provinces were forced to evacuate on Wednesday as a powerful typhoon approached the nation still reeling from a recent storm that left at least 182 dead and missing and emergency shelters crammed with displaced people.
Typhoon Kong-rey was last tracked 350 kilometers (217 miles) east of northern Cagayan province, with sustained winds of up to 185 kph (115 mph) and gusting up to 230 kph (143 mph). Forecasters said it could further strengthen at sea.
It was blowing northwestward and was predicted to pass near the northernmost Philippine province of Batanes before slamming into southeastern Taiwan on Thursday.
"We are still recovering from the two previous typhoon and storm and here we go again,” Batanes Governor Marilou Cayco told The Associated Press.
"We’re going around now to supervise the forced evacuation of people, specially those whose houses were severely damaged by the last storm,” Cayco said.
Elsewhere across the northern Philippines, more than 300,000 people displaced last week by Tropical Storm Trami, remained in emergency shelters as the new typhoon approached, Office of Civil Defense officials said.
Forecasters also warned of a “life-threatening storm surge reaching 2 to 3 meters (6.5 to 9.8 feet)” that could be whipped up by Kong-rey in low-lying coasts of Batanes and the nearby Babuyan cluster of islands.
All ships and cargo vessels were advised to remain in ports and those at sea should seek shelter or safe harbor as soon as possible until winds and waves subside.
Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr., who oversees disaster-response efforts, ordered the forced evacuation of people in high-risk areas threatened by Kong-rey, which is locally called Leon.
"We always aim for zero casualty in the event of disasters, so we strongly urge the public to heed our protocols,” Teodoro said.
While Kong-rey was expected to blow off the northern Philippines, its extensive rain band with a width of more than 600 kilometers (373 miles) could lash the entire main northern region of Luzon, the country’s most populous, the government said.
Tropical storm Trami, which blew out of the northern Philippines last Friday, left at least 145 dead and 37 missing mostly in widespread flooding and landslides and affected more than 7 million people in nearly 11,000 mostly rural villages, the government’s disaster-mitigation agency said.
More than 111,000 houses were damaged, many inundated by floods and swollen rivers. Trami dumped up to two months’ worth of rain in just 24 hours in some regions, setting off flash floods that swept away cars and trapped people on their roofs.
At the height of last week’s onslaught, officials in the hard-hit region of Bicol, southeast of the capital of Manila, appealed frantically for more rescue boats to save thousands of villagers trapped in rising floodwaters.
About 20 storms and typhoons batter the disaster-prone Philippines each year. In 2013, Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest recorded tropical cyclones in the world, left more than 7,300 people dead or missing, flattened entire villages and caused several cargo ships to ran aground inland and smash into houses and people in the central Philippines.
