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Yolanda lessons useful for earthquake preparation

May 22, 2015May 22, 2015 Ellen Leave a comment

West Valley Fault System. Phivolcs

The pain of a tragedy is assuaged by the lessons learned from it.

That is the case with the disaster that was how the Aquino government handled the damage wrought by super typhoon Yolanda (international name: Haiyan) in November 2013.

It was a reference point in several presentations in last Wednesday’s “Earthquake Resilience Conference” organized by the Carlos P. Romulo Foundation, Zuellig Family Foundation, and the Manila Observatory at the Manila Polo Club.

Yolanda destruction in Guiuan, Samar. VERA Files photo by Mario I. Ignacio.

Some of the Yolanda mistakes which should not happen again:

*Command and control not immediately established.
* Failure to immediately secure the area.
*Inadequate emergency communication system.
* Failure to tap private sector resources immediately especially in the airlift of goods.

Director Renato U. Solidum, Jr. of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology referred to the recent devastation in Nepal which was hit by a 7.8 intensity earthquake. More than 8,000 people were killed, hundreds were injured. Hundreds and thousands of buildings and structures were severely damaged.

Solidum talked of the West Valley Fault system in the Philippines which had the history of having moved four times in the past 1400 years. The last major earthquake from Valley Fault was in 1658.

“Hinog na hinog na,” he warned as he enjoined all sectors to prepare Now.

The grim scenario of 7.2 magnitude earthquake in Metro Manila: 31,000 dead and over 126,000 seriously injured. An additional 18,000 people may die from fires triggered by the earthquake.

Economic damage is estimated to reach 2.23 trillion pesos. Forty per cent of buildings and residential homes in Metro Manila may be destroyed or damaged and over three million people may need to be evacuated. Of particular concern are the 4-6 million informal settlers in the metropolitan area that are most at risk in the event of a major earthquake.

Metro Manila may separate into four isolated zones based on geography. Collapsed buildings in Makati and Mandaluyong as well as the Pasig River may separate the northern and southern parts of the metropolis, while broken road networks may isolate the west and east of the capital.The capital region faces isolation due to collapsed roads and buildings as well as fires.

Former Agrarian Reform Secretary Ernesto Garilao, now president of the Zuellig Family Foundation, said cities transected by the West Valley Fault are Quezon City,Marikina, Pasig,Makati,Taguig,and Muntinlupa.

Quezon City Mayor Herbert Bautista, whose presence in the conference indicates the importance that his city gives to disaster preparation, said the barangays most vulnerable in his area of jurisdiction are Silangan, Batasan Hills, Pansol, Libis, Blue Ridge, and Ugong Norte.

Identified Quezon City evacuation sites.

He said they have started the information campaign and reported that some homeowners in middle-class subdivisions like Blue Ridge are not cooperative and are even angry about the West Valley Fault reports as it would downgrade the value of their property.

He said the government has started retro-fitting the City Hall. They are planting trees along the fault.
He shared in the conference the Contingency Plan that they have prepared for Flood and Earthquake, which includes, within the first 24 hours, coming up with a master list of affected families (children, elderly, persons with disabilities), clustering them and assigning them to their respective tents.

It also includes deployment of temporary shelter and water purifier in every identified evacuation area.
Organizational structures were presented from local to national level. It was established that in the local level, it’s the mayor that is in charge.

Considering the problem of coordination among Metro Manila mayors in other issues like traffic, one asked, in the event of a Metro Manila wide severe damage, who’s in charge?

One of the resource persons replied: The Office of the President.

In our table the collective reaction was: “Naloko na.”

Manicani in Guiuan, Eastern Samar sets example

November 6, 2014November 6, 2014 Ellen Leave a comment

Manicani today. Two of the more than 400 houses built by Nickel Asia Corporation for victims of Yolanda.

GUIAN, Eastern Samar – It was in this town at the southernmost tip of Samar Island that typhoon Yolanda (international name, Haiyan), packing winds at 380 kilometers per hour, that made its first landfall at wee hours of Nov. 8, one year ago.

After four hours of howling, spine-tingling winds, only buildings and houses remained with roofs. Electric posts were toppled. Trees were uprooted. The sturdy coconut trees looked beaten with leaves dangling from the top.

Of the more than 47,000 population of Guiuan, more than two thousand were injured. A hundred perished.

Yolanda went on to inflict greater damage in the adjoining town of Leyte. Survivors said there is no exact number of those who died but definitely higher than the 6,000 the Aquino government wants to believe. They said if one totals the unidentified bodies buried in several mass graves, Yolanda claimed more than 15,000 lives.

Guiuan survivors 3 days after Yolanda struck last year.

One year after, gloom is still palpable in Tacloban, the capital of Leyte, although the residents have resumed their lives and are struggling to move on.

But it is not in Tacloban that President Aquino will be marking the first year of the tragedy.
It is here in Guiuan that President Aquino will report to the nation on how his government managed the worst disaster to have happened in this generation’s living memory.

Presidential Communications Operations Office Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said the President will turn over housing units to the families displaced by the typhoon that destroyed almost everything standing.
Coloma said, “The President would no longer go to Tacloban City in Leyte where most people were killed during the height of the typhoon.”

Survivors gather for a launching of rehabilitation of Manicani with the help of Nickel Asia Corporation. Feb. 2014.

Given the political hostilities between Aquino and his officials, especially Interior Secretary Mar Roxas, and Tacloban City mayor Alfred S. Romualdez, Guiuan is not only a safe choice. It is an inspired choice.
Guiuan is a good example of of “resilience” as defined by the United Nations Development Programme which is “the capacity to recover quickly from a difficult situation such as disasters.”

The other element of resilience which is “the ability to adapt quickly to changing situations such as a changing climate” remains to seen but under the competent leadership of its hardworking mayor, Christopher “Sheen” Gonzales, private sector and the international community, are positive about Guiuan’s ability to rise from the traumatic experience.

That was noted by Undersecretary Danilo Antonio of the Office of the Presidential Assistant for Rehabilitation and Recovery when he guested at the turnover of more than 400 houses built by Nickel Asia Corporation to Yolanda victims in the island of Manicani, part of Guiuan, last Wednesday.

NAC’s Dennis Zamora and PARR Undersecretary Danilo Antonio are joined by the barangay captains for the ceremonial groundbreaking for Manicani’s multi-purpose hall.

Antonio said, “Kayo ang unang tinamaan. At una rin kayo sa bumangon. (You were the first ones who were hit but you were also the first ones who stood up.)“

Last February,three months after Yolanda struck, Nickel Asia Corporation, which owns a non-operating mine in the island, started building the more than 400 houses for Manicani residents.

“This is just a start,” said Dennis Zamora, NAC senior vice president for marketing, who led the turnover of the houses , adding that working together, there are more things that they could accomplish.

Aquino should see how Manicani is bouncing back. It is something that he can tell the world about.

New UNICEF Rep is a Balikbayan

June 24, 2014June 24, 2014 Ellen Leave a comment

UNICEF PH Rep Lotta Sylwander

For Lotta Sylwander, her assignment to the Philippines as UNICEF Representative, is actually a homecoming.
Sylwander, from Sweden, was a backpack tourist way back in the 70’s and 80’s. She met and married (they are now divorced) someone from the Rojas family of Cavite. They have two children.

Sylwander arrived in Manila last April and has since immersed herself in UNICEF’s various projects with major focus on typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan)–ravaged areas.

An anthropologist, Sylwander was previously assigned in Vietnam and Zambia.

She is with Bangladeshi Zafrin Chowdhury, chief of Communication and Private Fundraising and Partnership, UNICEF Philippines, who arrived here more than eight months ago, just before the super typhoon struck the Philippines claimed the lives of some 10,000 people, and displaced tens of thousands more.

Before coming to the Philippines, Chowdhury, a former journalist, was in Myanmar where she led UNICEF’s communication efforts “through a complex democratic transition and gradual opening up for information and media scenario.”

Zafrin Chowdhury

Lotta and Zafrin met with a group of women columnists last Monday at the cozy Maria Luisa Garden Room in Makati. Chef Robert Lilja, a Swede, prepared special herring appetizers to welcome a distinguished compatriot.

Sylwander said almost six million children (a human being below the age of 18 years ) were affected by Yolanda. UNICEF, in close coordination with government agencies and local governments, has spent $140 million for Yolanda victims.

Sylwander said one of the first projects of UNICEF immediately after Yolanda devastated a number of provinces in the Visayas on Nov. 8, 2013 was the restoration of clean water system. That’s the reason why there has not been an outbreak of diseases caused by contaminated water.

They have also re-started their vaccination program.

Sylwander and Chowdhury talked about the impact of UNICEF ‘s Unconditional Cash Grants to vulnerable households affected by Typhoon Yolanda. They have allotted P6 million for 10,000 families.

They are giving each household $100 a month for six month to rebuild their lives. No conditions unlike that the World Bank -supported Conditional Cash Transfer (Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino) by the Department of Social Services and Developments which sets educational and healthcare requirements for children of beneficiary families.

UNICEF’s Unconditional Cash grant is an emergency measure to provide quick relief to families with children.
Sylwander said she is impressed that many of the beneficiary families of their Unconditional Cash Grant were able to set aside savings from the $100 a month that they give to start a means of livelihood like a bicycle or tricycle or a fishing boat.

Tacloban children displaced by Yolanda. Screengrab from ABS-CBN.

UNICEF also has a “school-in-a box” project which is “Everything you would need in a classroom in a box,” said Sylwander.They have also distributed 500,000 backpacks complete with school supplies to children in Yolanda-affected areas.

Beyond the Yolanda-devastated areas, Sylwander said she is concerned about high incidence of “stunting” among Filipino children who compose some 50 percent of population.

Stunting is chronic malnutrition and affects 30 per cent of Filipino children. That would be in the numbers of some 28 million.

She said the first five years of a child’s life is critical and he or she should be adequately nourished.
Stunting, she said, has far-reaching effects not only on the child but on the people and the nation. She said a chronically malnourished child does not develop fully physically, intellectually, mentally.

It goes without saying that a stunted child would not be able to perform well in school. If he or she performed poorly in school, he or she would not be inadequate in coping in a competitive society.

Both Lotta and Zafrin speak admirably of the Filipinos’ “resilience” amidst grief.

New UNICEF Rep is a Balikbayan

June 24, 2014June 24, 2014 Ellen Leave a comment

UNICEF PH Rep Lotta Sylwander

Sylwander arrived in Manila last April and has since immersed herself in UNICEF’s various projects with major focus on typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan)–ravaged areas.

An anthropologist, Sylwander was previously assigned in Vietnam and Zambia.

Zafrin Chowdhury

They have also re-started their vaccination program.

Sylwander and Chowdhury talked about the impact of UNICEF ‘s Unconditional Cash Grants to vulnerable households affected by Typhoon Yolanda. They have allotted P6 million for 10,000 families.

Tacloban children displaced by Yolanda. Screengrab from ABS-CBN.

Beyond the Yolanda-devastated areas, Sylwander said she is concerned about high incidence of “stunting” among Filipino children who compose some 50 percent of population.

Stunting is chronic malnutrition and affects 30 per cent of Filipino children. That would be in the numbers of some 28 million.

It goes without saying that a stunted child would not be able to perform well in school. If he or she performed poorly in school, he or she would not be inadequate in coping in a competitive society.

Both Lotta and Zafrin speak admirably of the Filipinos’ “resilience” amidst grief.

Guiuan rises with a lot of help from mining firm

February 18, 2014February 18, 2014 Ellen Leave a comment

By Ellen Tordesillas, VERA Files

Photos by Mario Ignacio IV

Yolanda survivors Lito G. Abucejo, 47, a carpenter and his wife, Rebecca, 44, marked the 100th day after the super typhoon slammed into Manicani Island in Guiuan, Eastern Samar, in a newly-built house.

The Abucejos have folded their United Nations-donated tent, which was their shelter the past three months, and are now living in a new structure built where their old house once stood.

The Abucejo’s new house is one of the more than 400 being built by Nickel Asia Corporation (NAC), which owns a non-operating nickel mine in Manicani.

Coco lumber felled by Yolanda are being used for the 30-square meter houses, being built on the property of the survivors. They are expected to last four to five years.

NAC and the local government will be working on a long-term rehabilitation and development of the island, where Yolanda made its first landfall last Nov. 8.

Aside from the houses in Manicani Island, NAC will also be underwriting the construction of 10 barangay halls in Guiuan and the reconstruction of the Guiuan Cathedral. The rehabilitation project is estimated to cost about P100 million.

Lito and Rebecca Abucejo shovel the concrete foundation of their house being built by Nickel Asia Corporation. Looking on are Usec Vic Batac of the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Reconstruction and Rehabilitation; Dennis Zamora, NAC senior VP for marketing; and Guiuan Mayor Christopher Gonzales.

At the launching of the Guiuan rehabilitation program recently, NAC President Gerry Brimo and NAC Senior Vice President for Marketing Undersecretary Dennis Zamora assured the residents of Manicani that their participation has “nothing to do with mining.”

“This is not about mining. This is about helping each other,” Zamora said.

Brimo told Manicani residents, “We are here to help.We need your trust.”

Undersecretary Vic Batac, who represented PARR Secretary Panfilo “Ping” Lacson during the launch of the Guiuan reconstruction, explained that it is the private sector, like NAC, that is leading in the rehabilitation of Yolanda-damaged areas.

That is good, he said because although the government is allotting money for the rehabilitation, government bureaucracy does not move as fast as the private sector.

Guiuan Mayor Christopher “Sheen” Gonzales said Manicani is close to his heart because that is his mother ‘s place. He said when Yolanda slammed into Guiuan early morning of Nov. 8, he thought it was the end of the world. For three to four hours, he recalled, they had to endure the the deafening fury of Yolanda. “Akala naming mamatay na kami, (We thought we were going to die.)”

After the storm, the whole of Guiuan was flattened. Roofs were blown away, buildings were destroyed. Less than 100 of the almost 50,000 population perished. In Manicani, one died.

The low casualty rate was due to the pre-typhoon preparations of the local government.

Gonzales said the Nickel Asia’s rehabilitation project for Guiuan shows that “They care for us.”
“Let’s cooperate,” he enjoined the residents.

Manicani residents are thankful that NAC is taking care of constructing their new houses. What they need now are means of livelihood. Fisherman Edgardo Padero, who survived Yolanda by taking refuge under the table, said his boat and “baklad” (fishing net) were destroyed.

Lecenia Cometa, a councilwoman in Barangay Hamorawon, recalled that while Yolanda was smashing into their island and their house, all 16 of them hid under a table that sits 10. Nimfa Cabusora, Barangay Hamorawod treasurer, said they survived the fury of Yolanda by hiding inside the cabinet.

Like Padero, their fishing nets were washed out by the typhoon together with their Petromax.

They are hoping more kind-hearted companies would help them with their fishing equipment.

(VERA Files is put out by veteran journalists taking a deeper look at current issues. Vera is Latin for “true.”)