Apocalyptic Flooding in the Philippines

[AslanCross]

Friends in the Playground, the Philippines has just experienced its own Katrina.
Yesterday, a relatively weak storm dumped a record amount of rainfall: Within six hours, the equivalent of our average monthly rainfall came down upon the capital Metro Manila and its surrounding provinces.

Now Metro Manila is a city built between the sea and mountains. As you might guess, all the water from the mountains falls into the city. We're no stranger to floods, but yesterday, even high-lying roads were turned into rivers.

The bad part is that our woefully-underequipped weather bureau was unable to predict that this weak storm was bringing the heaviest rainfall our city has ever experienced. As such, many people went to work, school, and their general business until the deluge came.

I myself went to a university only 20 minutes away from my house to take an entrance test for my graduate studies. At first I thought the rain wasn't so bad, but I realized during the course of the exam that it wasn't stopping and it was coming down HARD.

This coincided with the University's elementary branch's school fair and regular Saturday classes.

By the time the test finished at noon, the highway in front of the campus was a river. Residents across the street filmed this chilling scene:

A van being swallowed by the abyss. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t77NYsflAY&NR=1)


Just across the highway in the background is the campus I was in.

Note that this campus is on high ground, so many of the people in the campus, myself included, were stranded inside. It was relatively safe; vending machines provided food and drink for those inside. I waited for 3 hours until the highway became navigable and tried to go home.

It took me 6 hours to get home. The already convoluted traffic systems of the city were thrown into utter chaos by unnavigable streets, counterflow, and floods. I passed several minor accidents; cars were traveling too slowly to damage each other severely. Still, the cars ended up obstructing the already overloaded roads.

I was thankful I eventually reached a stretch of clear road; I tried to take an underground tunnel that bypassed the congested intersections. Unfortunately, it was waist-deep in water; I avoided it by turning back.

Since this area was close to the school I taught in, I decided to take a detour. I flashed my ID at the gate. It was already way after hours (8 pm) and the campus had experienced its own horrible flooding, but the guards let me stay. I lost my patience eventually and decided to push for home.

I got stuck at the last intersection leading home. I waited for 20 minutes for a bus to get out of the way. Eventually I made it.

The 20 minute drive home took six hours. I was one of the fortunate ones.

My house was intact and untouched by the flood. My mother, trapped at work, was able to find her way home without much trouble. All my family members were accounted for and safe.

Many of my mom's officemates at church, along with our church's pastors, were stranded. Many people in the area were stranded as well, along with the people in the mall below our church, so our church provided shelter to them for the night.

Likewise, the university I was from offered shelter to the many stranded students, employees, and people from the area. The org building has been turned into a makeshift refugee center.

Many others were flooded out of their homes and had to spend the night on their roofs. Others are still there, awaiting rescue--starving, cold, and sick.

Another university experienced a horrible flood as well. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOiBM6M9bg0)
Manila's main river swamps a slum on the far bank. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqAdaiCZBQ4)

The house of one of my more fortunate friends.
http://photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs244.snc1/9122_271105245037_684220037_9044490_2815210_n.jpg
Her family's car.
http://photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs244.snc1/9122_271104995037_684220037_9044453_2148989_n.jpg

Others are even less fortunate. (WARNING: NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART)
http://2.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kqmcco5Fpa1qa5v63o1_500.jpg

I'm warm, have food, shelter, power, clean water, and Internet access--as such, I've many things to be thankful for, but as of now, it's time for us who escaped unscathed to help. Please keep us in your prayers---many are still stranded. If you wish to help in any way, let me know---I'll see if I can find a way to patch you through. Communication is still difficult as many cell sites got knocked out by power outages.

[Trobby]

Oh my god...that's terrible. :smallfrown: My prayers go out to all the souls lost in the flood, and my hopes go out to everyone who survived, hoping for recovery of the city.

[CrimsonAngel]

Holy frick, I should have read the warning before clicking the spoiler. :smalleek:

[Trog]

Oh man that's horrible. :smalleek: I'm glad you and your loved ones are uninjured and safe now. Hopefully the rains will diminish in the near future and prevent the prolonging of the flooding issues. Flood destruction takes an awful lot of clean up work and that takes time. Here's wishing you all a speedy recovery.

[UnChosenOne]

Why I didn't find that last picture disturding? But you and all other survivors do have my sympathies.

[AslanCross]

The worst of the rains stopped yesterday. It's a sunny day today, so my mom and I are going to help with the relief efforts.

EDIT:

Cars tossed around by the flood.
http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs269.snc1/9616_1223444274495_1480642541_638915_6787543_n.jpg

Sadly, in some places, corpses were found in the cars.

EDIT again: If you wish to help, please donate through the International Red Cross.

[bosssmiley]

Dang! Suddenly the damp and misty British climate seems paradisical. :smalleek:

Glad you and yours are safe AslanCross.

[AslanCross]

Thanks. I've been working in our church's relief center for the past few days. Thanks to our connections in the military, we've been able to rapidly distribute the goods to the affected areas.

The problem now is that another tropical storm is coming, and some affected areas are still underwater. Times like these I wish I could cast Control Weather.

[Vizen]

Oh....Oh gods. I hope things clear up and not TOO much damage has been done. Especially if more is on the way.

[AslanCross]

I went to clean a house today in one of the hardest hit areas. If you want an idea of how deep the floods were, look at a bus and imagine a mud stain halfway up the door. It was that deep in most places at road level, and many of the communities that were hit were 2-3 feet below road level.

The lady whose house we cleaned had broken her arm (she slipped and had a very bad fall) while trying to clean after the storm and was only living in a rather large house with her son and 88-year old mother. As such, they couldn't get rid of all the mud inside and it was quickly turning putrid.

We went through her kitchen and discovered that her cupboard was full of mud---and so were the cooking utensils inside. The mud wasn't the kind of stuff you'd let your kid play in---it was sticky clay silt and had the consistency of melted ice cream. It carried the stench of dead things in it.

On the way back, we passed by a mall whose underground parking lot was right beside one of the primary rivers that burst their banks. The pillars were covered in black, tarry mud, and trash was scattered for hundreds of meters along the river banks.

As we crossed the bridge, a bunch of cars was parked by the side. We were wondering what it was, until a guy walking past our car made a throat-slitting gesture.

There were corpses floating in the river.

[Elm11]

Oh... oh hell, that's, that's just a bit to hard to express. Aslan, i'm sorry, i'm really, very sorry.

[Arastor]

Surprised to see mention of this here.

Apparently, an entire month's rain fell on the city in six hours. It was the worst flood in over forty years. Much of the problem is the lack of preparation. And that our storm signal system is based on wind speed.

I was in similar circumstances as aslan, and by noon, nearly every road leading out of the university was waist deep in water. I was able to leave through an obscure pedestrian exit few people go through. It's a big university.

The others who stayed waited for five more hours until the roads became passable.

Thankfully, our place was high enough to weather the storm in it's entirety. Down the street however, it's another matter entirely. Cars were bobbing up and down, and people were huddling on rooftops.

The day after, we went to clean up our church, whose basement was still flooded. We caught some fish there, and spent much of the day cleaning up, and sorting through the trash that filtered in from the floods.

Also, the coming tropical storm is now a Category 4 hurricane. And there's another one coming after that.

[Mercenary Pen]

I'm glad you guys are at least physically okay.

I don't look at the news much, but there are one or two people from the Philippines within the church I attend, so I'm a little surprised that I heard nothing about it.

I don't know what else to say, but I will keep the area in my prayers.

[Ilena]

Well a friend of mine from the philippines just came onto a chat and said hes ok, and his place escaped the floods so its some good news for me. And for the rest .... im sorry to hear ...

[AslanCross]

Unfortunately another storm is coming within 36 hours, and this one is a Category 5. By contrast the previous one was only Category 2. It doesn't seem to be hitting us directly, but its size and strength are frightening.

[Elm11]

Good luck Aslan, and good luck Arastor. I hope you all get through this alright, and i'll be paying attention to any news i can get.

[Arastor]

Well that was quick. The storm's worst has just come and gone within an hour or so. The closest the storm will reach Manila. If it doesn't change course again.

Here's hoping for the guys up north, where the storm is predicted to make landfall.

[AslanCross]

Yeah, I told my friends there to get ready. I have a friend who's in the rice growing business in that area and he says that if the storm destroys the current harvest, rice growers aren't going to get any new income for the rest of the year. It's a nasty prospect whatever the case. I was hoping that it would follow the earlier projected course (according to CNN and other international sources) that it would just graze the land mass. Unfortunately, that seems to no longer be the case.

[AslanCross]

This is probably my last post in this thread. We're all so thankful here that we were spared from further damage: the Category 5 typhoon weakened to Cat 2 when it made landfall and veered off so far to the north that it barely affected us here. It just brought a breeze and some drizzling, but it even missed the rice-producing districts up north. As of now there haven't been any deaths reported since everyone was prepared for it.

Here's (http://wp.me/p1L6i-9F)my complete story if anyone's interested in reading it.

[Eon]

Glad your okay. it may not seem much but i can't think of the words right now on what i'm trying to mean...

[Ravens_cry]

Glad you and your near and dear are all right. I will pray for the families of those lost in this tragedy.