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Death toll from Philippines typhoon rises to 12: officials
Manila (AFP) Nov 27, 2007 The death toll from Typhoon Mitag rose to 12 in the Philippines, officials said Tuesday as search operations continued for a missing air force jet and a fishing vessel with 27 people aboard. The number of people displaced also jumped to nearly half a million across 19 provinces ravaged by flash floods and landslides triggered by the storm, the Office of Civil Defence said. Mitag has weakened as it exited the Philippines towards the southern islands of Japan, but provinces in the north of Luzon island continued to be battered by strong winds and rains. Tropical storm Hagibis meanwhile continued to dump rains over the islands of Palawan and Mindoro and was heading in a east-northeasterly direction. Hagibis killed 13 people last week in its initial pass over the Philippines. It reversed course Monday to merge with Mitag sinking a fishing boat near the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, leaving 27 Filipino crewmen missing, officials said. A Philippine air force jet sent to search for the crew members also went missing in the area on Monday, the military said. Another brewing storm meanwhile was expected to hit the Philippines in the next four days and bring more rains to the eastern part of Luzon and the central Philippines, the weather bureau said. The air force said it was searching for the S-211 reconnaissance jet and its two pilots in the Spratlys. Armed forces chief General Hermogenes Esperon said the aircraft probably crashed in the South China Sea. The US Navy has dispatched an Orion surveillance aircraft to help in the search, he added. "They are still working at it alongside our naval assets," Esperon said. "We are praying hard that ... the pilots survived the incident, but up to now there are no indications of that." The coast guard and navy said there was also no sign of the capsized fishing vessel or any of its crew. Rescuers, aided by the military, on Tuesday continued to clear roads of debris and to restore communication lines, the civil defence office said. In northern Isabela province, where Mitag made landfall late Sunday, authorities were trying to get people to leave evacuation centres and return to their homes as the situation slowly returned to normal. "The effects were not as bad as we had anticipated," provincial governor Grace Padaca said. "We are now collating reports from the field to assess the damage to our rice and corn fields." The agriculture department in Manila said the storms damaged more than 6,000 hectares (14,820 acres) of agricultural crops worth over one hundred million pesos (2.4 million dollars). jvg-strs/cgm/kw/mtp Related Links Bringing Order To A World Of Disasters When the Earth Quakes A world of storm and tempest
Typhoon Mitag slams into Philippines: officials
Manila (AFP) Nov 26, 2007Rescuers went on full alert Monday after Typhoon Mitag slammed into the Philippines, killing at least eight people and forcing hundreds of thousands from their homes in one of the country's largest evacuation operations in recent history. |
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