News: 5,800 Botolan folk told to permanently leave homes

5,800 Botolan folk told to permanently leave homes
By Ding Cervantes
The Philippine Star
Originally posted: October 10, 2009

SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga , Philippines – Zambales Gov. Amor Deloso said residents of four barangays in Botolan town have to permanently abandon their homes as the Bucao River continues to flow through their villages toward the South China Sea.

Rampaging waters from the Bucao River, which first wreaked havoc in Botolan during storm “Kiko” last Aug. 6, have prevented some 5,800 evacuees from returning to their homes in Barangays Carael, Paudpod, Batonlapoc, and lower San Juan.

A dike breached during Kiko collapsed again during tropical storm “Ondoy.”

An official of the Provincial Disaster Coordina-ting Council earlier admitted that the natural channel of the Bucao River used to flow through the four affected barangays.

Earlier, Chief Superintendent Leon Nilo de la Cruz, Central Luzon police director, said the government would permanently relocate the displaced residents and allow the Bucao River to run its path now.

De la Cruz said Public Works and Highways Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane reached this decision in a recent meeting of the Regional Disaster Coordinating Council.

“The decision was to let the river seek its natural course,” he said, echoing statements that the Bucao River has merely reclaimed its original channel.

Flooding since Ondoy has affected 10 out of 31 barangays in Botolan, but the four barangays that Deloso named were the most severely affected.

The provincial government, Deloso said, is now drafting a master plan for a 4,000-unit socialized housing project that will be put up on a 52-hectare land he himself donated near the still-to-be-completed Iba-Tarlac Road in upper San Juan.

Deloso could not readily give an estimate of the cost of each housing unit but said the road construction alone would amount to some P61 million.

“We are trying to lessen the cost of the project so that the beneficiaries will not have a hard time paying for their units,” he said.

Related post: 2 flood-hit Botolan villages now in river's path - DPWH

News: Flooded cemetery disgorges tombs, bones

Flooded cemetery disgorges tombs, bones
By Robert Gonzaga
Inquirer.net (source)

BOTOLAN, Zambales – It was surreal and frightening sight that greeted residents here this week: Floating coffins and corpses, body parts and human bones washed ashore.

In the village cemetery of Paco, which is now littered with the ripped clothing of corpses and where the odor of rotting flesh lingers in the air, several rows of tombs lay open or submerged in floodwater.

All around the area, villagers rushed to save whatever was left of their departed relatives: clothes worn by the dead, their caskets and their bones.

Sunken tombs had gaping holes where villagers pulled the remains to save them from being swept away by rampaging floodwaters.

Since Typhoon “Kiko” dumped heavy rains and breached a major dike that flooded the town in August, residents had started worrying about the flooded cemetery.

“I went to look for my father who was buried there and did not find him. His body was one of those that got swept by the water along with many other corpses,” said Feliciano Pagar, 52.

He said he had to destroy the tombs of his brother and his child who were buried there “so I won’t lose them.”

“I opened their tombs and took their bones out of there. I had to do it, most residents were doing it, too,” he said.

Pagar said he asked local officials if the town government could pay for the transfer and burial of the remains of his relatives to another area in the cemetery.

“I don’t have the money to pay for another burial. Their remains are now in small tombs provided for those who asked for them,” he said.

Flooding in Botolan was aggravated by heavy rains spawned by tropical storm “Ondoy” and typhoon “Pepeng.”

Some of the floods were also believed brought by excess water released from dams that were connected to river systems leading to Zambales and other provinces in Central Luzon.

News: Destruction everywhere in Botolan

Destruction everywhere in Botolan
By Robert Gonzaga
Inquirer.net (source)

BOTOLAN, Zambales – After the howling of winds stopped and heavy rains that triggered massive floods here became a drizzle, residents are struggling to regain a sense of normalcy amid the devastation that has swept the town.

In the coastal village of Bangan, a community facing the South China Sea, Conrado Durong, 64, said Typhoon “Pepeng” left an unexpected and unwelcome trace of its passing before it raced toward extreme Northern Luzon.

“Our problem here is not just the flooding, but also the waves coming from the sea. We have to watch out for them every time there is a storm, like this last one,” he said.

Durong said the waves rose to almost as high as some of the coconut trees and crashed into houses along the coast, decimating a section of the village populated by fishermen and their families.

Bigger waves
No one, however, was hurt. Residents did not consider it out of the ordinary because most of them had gone through similar experiences, although Durong said his fellow villagers ran to the town plaza in panic as the waves grew bigger and bigger this time.

“Where the water is now, there were houses before. Each storm that comes here takes away a little of our village. This time, the sea took a lot. My house did not get hit because it was farther away from the shore. But they should build a seawall here just to be safe,” he said.

Mayor Rogelio Yap said the waves might have risen due to high tide and this is the typhoon’s exit path.

“Also, since the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo [in 1991], the shoreline in that area has come closer to the houses there,” he said.

Of eight coastal villages in Botolan, only Bangan was hit hard by crashing waves.

Rice farms gone
A cluster of rice fields which leads to Capayawan, another village of Botolan hit hard by the flooding, is now gone. A wide expanse of agricultural land in Capayawan is now navigable only by boat.

“There used to be farms here. Now there is a new river that leads to the South China Sea. We lost our livelihood. A relative living nearby lost her house. We have to place sandbags in front of our houses to prevent the floodwater from reaching us,” said farmer Manolo Dagsaan, 47, a resident of Capayawan.

He said those who owned boats have been offering rides.

Many residents now fear that a significant area of Botolan would be wiped out by the widespread flooding.

Julius Dimayuga, 37, whose family has lived for a long time in Barangay San Juan near the Bucao Dike, said the dike breached because “it was made of cheap materials.”

Under water
“Now, almost a third of San Juan is under water. A lot of houses there are abandoned. I have taken my family to an evacuation center. It seems like all their focus is on that bridge in Carael but not yet on other parts of Botolan,” he said.

Let's pray for our kababayans in Botolan and other affected areas in Zambales and other provinces.

News: Botolan flood misery refuses to end

Please don't forget the provinces. They still haven't recovered from the previous storms.

Botolan flood misery refuses to end

BOTOLAN, Zambales -- It is a test of resilience that residents of this town may not be able to bear any longer, forcing them to cry out loud for help.

In August, Typhoon “Labuyo” struck the town of more than 58,000 people, soaking clothes, appliances, mementos, food and lives in muddy, murky flood waters.

Labuyo struck just as the town thought it was on its way to recovery from previous flooding. Barely a month after, the rains poured again followed shortly by floods.

The disaster bore a different name, “Ondoy,” but it brought the same, if not higher, levels of destruction and suffering to the town.

Since August 6, thousands of evacuees in 16 evacuation centers here have become dependent on other people’s help since their houses were destroyed by floodwaters.

Forgotten

Now food is running out and most of the people are getting sick, according to Lorenzo Cailing Jr., spokesperson and president of a group of evacuees in Botolan.

He said in the last five days over 500 families in two evacuation centers have not received relief goods.

“Many people here think that we have been forgotten. We have not received anything ... We have been here for almost two months already,” he said.

He said the last batch of relief goods that came was from the social welfare department office of Botolan.

Each family got half a kilogram of rice, two sardine cans and two packs of noodles.

“We don’t know when the next relief goods would come. We’re sure that what they gave us won’t last long,” said Cailing.

The children are vulnerable to disease, although the elderly, too, suffer from coughs, fever, diarrhea and skin diseases.

“Our water source is also a problem,” he said.

A deep well that supplies water is 5 feet from a septic tank. Toilets don’t have doors “so we just cover them with umbrellas,” he said.

Nosebleed

The evacuees live in tents or shelter boxes donated by the Rotary Club International.

Rogelio Lima, 47, an evacuee from Barangay Carael, expressed gratitude for the shelter boxes but said the people could only stay there until 9 a.m.

“After that, it gets so hot your nose could bleed. We have to stay outside,” he said.

In Pampanga, the provincial government and private groups pooled funds and distributed relief goods to Ondoy victims in the province.

Governor Eddie Panlilio visited victims in Arayat town where 12 persons died in a landslide.

The provincial social welfare development office distributed more than P1 million worth of relief goods, including 60 cavans of rice, 140 boxes of canned goods, blankets, mosquito nets and kitchen ware, to flood victims in Masantol, Sta. Ana, Sta. Rita and Candaba towns and City of San Fernando.

Seeds, fingerlings and piglets will also be distributed to flooded villages while P12 million was allotted for the repair of dikes, roads and bridges and other government facilities.

Help coming

In Clark Freeport, the Clark Development Corp. (CDC), Clark locators, and the Philippine Air Force 600th Air Base Wing have raised more than P1 million to help typhoon victims.

Benigno Ricafort, CDC president, said the CDC and the Clark International Airport Corp. (CIAC) each donated P250,000 while Cyber City Teleservices gave P100,000. Smart Shirts Phils. pledged P100,000 worth of clothes.

The National Information and Communications Technology Confederation appealed to all its member councils and partners to likewise help.

SM City Clark and SM City Pampanga have put up donation boxes inside their malls.

News: Flood after flood, Botolan victims kept from returning home, are now restless

Flood after flood, Botolan victims kept from returning home, are now restless

Written by Henry Empeño / Correspondent
Monday, 28 September 2009 18:20

BOTOLAN, Zambales—After losing their homes and most of their belongings to a series of floods that inundated 10 villages in this town since early August, residents who fled to the safety of higher grounds face new problems, mainly lack of food and medicine, as well as a stressful life in overcrowded evacuation centers that have served as their temporary homes.

“They badly need basic items like food, potable water, medicine, clothing, and most of all, housing,” said Vibelen Dimalupig, a social-welfare officer in Zambales, during a briefing at the capitol building in Iba on Thursday.

The relief goods issued by the government and those that come from donors “simply cannot cope” with the needs of the displaced families, she added.

The massive displacement of residents here began last month after heavy rains spawned by Typhoon Kiko combined with excess runoff from the mountains and packed a deadly headwater of debris-filled watery lahar.

The rampaging waters then breached a portion of the San Juan dike along the Bucao River, one of the major catch basins of lahar from Mount Pinatubo, and shifted the river course to nearby villages, sending residents scampering to safety.

In the aftermath of the typhoon, 4,783 families comprising 20,581 persons were displaced, a summary report prepared by the Zambales Provincial Disaster Operation Center showed. These included 4,913 persons from the riverside barangay of San Juan; 3,655 from the village of Carael, where the river passes through; 2,292 from Paco; 2,064 from Bangan; and about 1,500 each from the villages of Tampo, Batonlapoc, Paudpod, Capayawan, Beneg and San Miguel.

In the succeeding weeks when more typhoons brought torrential rains to Zambales, the number of evacuees in Botolan rose and fell along with the dreaded floodwaters, social workers noted.

When Typhoon Maring lashed the province on September 7, for example, 4,673 families were again affected by flash floods.

Of these, 718 families said their houses were totally damaged, while 333 reported that theirs were partially destroyed, a report by Botolan social-welfare officer Isagani Ecle said.

The new floods again led 1,931 families to seek refuge at evacuation centers, and 1,277 others to stay with relatives elsewhere.

Because of the recurring floods, 2,141 families composed of 7,942 men, women and children are still housed in 12 evacuation centers scattered in this municipality as of September 24.

But the relative safety of evacuation centers has apparently started to wear thin and exact some toll on the evacuees over time.

The emerging culprit, evacuees complained, is overcrowding that has inevitably strained the facilities and resources in the evacuation centers.

At the New Taugtog resettlement area, for example, a total of 901 evacuees from 235 families share a warehouse-like structure previously occupied by the Technology Learning and Resources Center.

Camping inside the building, the evacuees erected makeshift rooms that they share with family members and occasionally, household pets like dogs.

Over time, however, the noise and smell became hardly bearable that it was hard to sleep, said 74-year-old Gloria Dimacusa, who evacuated with her six grandchildren.

To make matters worse, the building has only three toilets to serve the whole evacuee population.

Social workers in this town admitted that the situation could be worse in other evacuation centers like the Babon San Juan, which has 1,771 evacuees, or the so-called Tent City, which has a total of 1,288 evacuees.

Gina Acuña, a rural health officer in this town, said the unsanitary condition in the evacuation centers, coupled by lack of adequate food and medicine, has made some residents sick.

Most of those afflicted have acute respiratory tract infection, fever, colds and cough, headache, abdominal pain and diarrhea, Acuña added.

Severino Magsanop, a 93-year-old retired soldier, has been living with his wife Felisa, 80, at the Taugtog resettlement site ever since their house in barangay San Juan became flooded last month.

Magsanop said the government should do what it can to help evacuees rebuild their houses and their lives.

“It’s very difficult to live in this kind of place,” Magsanop told the media in Pilipino during a visit last week. “We’re overcrowded in here. The place is dirty and it smells bad.”

The same plea came from Ester Josafat, 69, and Andres Bulanhigan, 65, who also left their family homes in San Juan when the floods ran roughshod over the village.

Bulanhigan, a vegetable farmer who has three children ages 5 to 16, said it is important for them to have a new home.

“We can make do with not much food, even with a few belongings, but we need to have our own house,” he said.

Zambales affected by Typhoon Labuyo

After the typhoon Kiko, we now have typhoon Labuyo affecting the residents of Zambales.

Severe floods hit Zambales areas
By Robert Gonzaga, Anselmo Roque

OLONGAPO CITY, Philippines - Heavy rains caused by Typhoon “Labuyo” flooded sections of this city and other parts of Zambales on Tuesday.

The floods that hit at least nine Olongapo villages were the most severe since 1997, said Angelito Layug, city disaster management chief.

“We have not seen something like this since 1997. The river in Sta. Rita overflowed fast, and there is a lot of flooding in the city,” he said.

Layug said the floods swamped the villages of East and West Bajac Bajac, Gordon Heights, Sta. Rita, Old Cabalan, Mabayuan, Ilalim, Kababae and Barrio Barreto

More than 70 people, mostly from Sta. Rita and Old Cabalan, were taken to the Olongapo City National High School while other flood victims chose to seek shelter with their relatives in other parts of the city.

Rains also triggered minor landslides that blocked a road and damaged at least two houses.

Employees of the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority at the Subic Bay Freeport were allowed to go on leave Tuesday due to the flooding in Olongapo, where most SBMA workers live.

“Almost 80 percent of our employees are affected by the floods. That’s the SBMA’s workers alone [excluding those who work in companies inside the freeport],” said SBMA Administrator Armand Arreza.

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Just two weeks ago, I was able to go to Candelaria. The roads in Botolan were passable, but you could clearly see the devastation Kiko wrought. Now there's news (still looking for it though), that the town's flooded again. :(

I was able to take some photos from the bus. I can only imagine how it might be now that it's raining again.

Botolan, Zambales: Aftermath of Typhoon Kiko.

News: Botolan folk told: Watch out for typhoons

Botolan folk told: Watch out for typhoons
By Tonette Orejas

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga—Filipino-American geologist Kelvin Rodolfo has asked his province mates in Botolan, Zambales to be constantly aware of typhoons and monsoon warnings from the weather bureau, urging them to map out evacuation plans to avoid floods and lahar.

In an e-mail from Chicago, Rodolfo said the August 6 flashfloods, which displaced some 7,000 families in 10 villages in Botolan, happened because the Bucao River received runoff from a huge watershed that is still filled with lahar from Mt. Pinatubo’s 1991 eruptions.

“All the runoff from rain [fall] on 270 square kilometers (sq km) on Pinatubo itself, plus 390 sq km from areas outside Pinatubo to the north, mainly the Balintawak-Cabatuan river sytem,” Rodolfo said of what drains to Bucao River before spilling to the South China Sea.

Dr. Renato Solidum, chief of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs), said the flood was caused by heavy rains in the watershed of Bucao River.

That watershed, he said, includes not only the slopes of Mt. Pinatubo but also the mountains west and north of the volcano.

Strong current heavy with lahar and mud breached almost a kilometer of the Bucao dike, swamping 10 villages up to more than 1.52 meters of floodwater.

The volcanic sediments that settled on the village of Carael, which were more than two meters high as of Sunday, caused the river to flow back to the other villages before heading out to the sea, said Alfredo Tolentino, director of the Department of Public Works and Highways in Central Luzon.

“People need to be constantly aware of typhoon and monsoon weather warnings from [the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration] and should have a standing plan as to high ground to go to, and a good route to it,” Rodolfo said.

The study, “Two years of lahar on the western flank of Mt. Pinatubo: Initiation, flow processes, deposits, and attendant geomorphic and hydraulic changes,” provides scientific data and findings on what lies ahead of Botolan and other Zambales towns located on the western side of the volcano.

The study, the most extensive of its kind for a Philippine volcano, was done by Rodolfo, Jess Umbal and Rosalito Alonso (University of Illinois at Chicago), Cristina Remotigue (National Institute of Geological Sciences, University of the Philippines Diliman), Ma. Lynn Paladio-Melosantos (Phivolcs), Jerry Salvador and Digna Evangelista (Mines and Geosciences Bureau), and Yvonne Miller (University of Geneva).

The study said about two-thirds of the five to six cubic kilometers of rocks, ash, sand, mud, and gases that Pinatubo spewed out in 1991 settled on the western slopes.

“[Lahar deposits] have filled channels almost to capacity, so future flows are expected to avulse out of the present lahar field along new routes,” it said.

The sediments were “funneled principally” into the Bucao and Santo Tomas rivers. These had filled the channels, spilled out and buried villages and farms.

“Considering the vast quantity of fresh pyroclastic debris, lahar, and excess sedimentation may continue for five to 10 years or longer,” it said.

The Bucao River, with a total watershed of 659 sq km, drains the west and northwest of the volcano and its terrain. The river’s Pinatubo portion, spanning 270 sq km, is “by far the largest catchment basin on the volcano.”

The southern part of the Bucao watershed, on the other hand, is drained by nine tributaries of the upper Balin Baquero River, which is joined by the Maraunot River downstream.

Rodolfo said monsoon rains must be watched because 70 to 80 percent of at least 3,800 millimeters of annual rainfall in the province is delivered by the southwest monsoon (habagat) from June to September.

News: Flood overwhelms Philippine rescuers, death toll at 20

Flood overwhelms Philippine rescuers, death toll at 20

BOTOLAN, Philippines: Rescuers struggled to evacuate hundreds of villagers caught by rampaging flash floods in the northern Philippines on Saturday as the death toll rose to 20, officials said.

Police said the bodies of eight of 12 miners buried Friday by a landslide that hit a mining area in the northern city of Baguio have been recovered.

Provincial police chief Senior Superintendent Danilo Pelisco said they were still looking for six other miners.

Some 173,171 people in seven provinces in the northern island of Luzon have been displaced by flooding and landslides in the wake of Typhoon Morakot, which grazed the country before making landfall in Taiwan overnight, disaster relief officials said.

Among those also killed were two French tourists and a Belgian who went hiking on Mount Pinatubo volcano on Thursday despite warnings from local officials of rampaging waters on its slopes.

In the northern town of Botolan in Zambales provinces, rescuers on Saturday were battling strong currents to evacuate hundreds of residents marooned in their homes after rainwater and mud from the slopes of Pinatubo breached a dike.

A portion of the main highway leading to Botolan had been transformed into a rampaging river, and the current had swept away entire homes, trees and vehicles, an AFP photographer said.

"We are going to look for higher ground," said Joey Tiago, a member of the ethnic Aeta tribe, after he and his family managed to escape. "The water came suddenly Wednesday night, and we fled quickly toward safely with just our clothes on."

He said his home had been washed away.

On Friday, the air force said helicopters had plucked out about 300 children from submerged Botolan homes.

The government has declared Zambales under a "state of calamity" and released emergency funding to help the provincial government.

The state weather bureau said that while Morakot had now passed the Philippines, it would continue to bring rains across Luzon that could cause flash floods and landslides.

This video was taken by my mom yesterday around noon.