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

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.