Philippines storm toll over 900 as new typhoon hits

MANILA: Over 900 people were dead or missing after a storm triggered landslides and floods in the Philippines this week, rescuers announced on Thursday as a new and even more powerful typhoon approached the main island of Luzon.

Army rescuers listed 306 dead and 152 missing from this hapless town on the east coast of Luzon, which was flattened by floods and an avalanche of mud, logs and boulders from the Sierra Madre mountain range on Monday.

A total of 131 bodies have been found in the nearby town of General Nakar with about 100 residents still missing, while the town of Infanta yielded 47 dead with about 100 also missing, according to an army tally.

The tally excludes 48 people who died and 38 listed as missing elsewhere on Luzon, home to nearly half the archipelago’s population of 84 million. The health secretary urged the hard-hit communities quickly to bury rotting bodies found from under the mud and floating on the coast and along swollen rivers, to prevent epidemics. Lime has been sent to flood-hit communities to try to preserve some of the dead so they may be identified before burial but there may not be enough preservative to go around, he said. Luzon braced for the fury of Typhoon Nanmadol on Thursday as the cyclone killed one man on an outlying island, tore down power lines and hampered rescuers trying to reach victims of Monday’s storm. afp

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