Casualty Figures Moving Closer to FIRE-EARTH Forecasts
Super Typhoon HAIYAN has killed at least 10,000 people in the Tacloban alone, according to the provincial governor.
Tacloban, officially the City of Tacloban (pop: 230,000), located central Philippines province of Leyte, bore the brunt of HAIYAN. The casualty figure has not yet been confirmed by the central government’s disaster agency.
FIRE-EARTH Disaster Models calculated the impact of Super Typhoon HAIYAN in the Philippines as a magnitude 6.2 catastrophe on the FEWW Disaster Scale, indicating large-scale regional destruction with up to 40,000 casualties, the blog said on Saturday.
Summary of Latest Events
Typhoon HAIYAN was downgraded to a Cat. 4A storm force on the FEWW New Hurricane Scale racing toward Indochina Peninsula, over the warm (29ºC) waters of South China Sea, at a forward speed of about 35 km/hr, as of 04:30UTC on Saturday November 9, 2013.
UPDATES – Sunday November 10, 2013
- According to the latest official figures, about 500,000 people have been displaced and more than 4.5 million people affected as a result of the typhoon attack.
- At least 300 people were killed in Samar province, with 2,000 others reported as missing. Scores of others are injured. “However vast areas of Samar, an island of over 733,000, still have not been contacted over two days after the typhoon struck.” AFP said.
- Authorities in Vietnam have evacuated about 900,000 people in 11 provinces.
- “Tacloban is totally destroyed. Some people are losing their minds from hunger or from losing their families,” a high school teacher told reporters. “People are becoming violent. They are looting business establishments, the malls, just to find food, rice and milk… I am afraid that in one week, people will be killing from hunger.”
- “People are walking like zombies looking for food,” said a medical student in Leyte. “It’s like a movie.”
- A tourist describing the scene of total devastation in Tacloban City said: “It’s like the end of the world.”
- Aerial surveys show “significant damage to coastal areas” with large ships thrown ashore, countless homes destroyed and large swathes of crops “decimated,” said The U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA).
- President Benigno Aquino is reportedly considering to impose martial law to stem the widespread looting (!)
Typhoon HAIYAN – IR/Water Vapor Difference [FIRE-EARTH Enhancement] satellite image (recorded at 02:30UTC on November 10, 2013. Original image sourced from: CIMSS/SSEC/WISC.
UPDATES – Saturday November 9, 2013
- As of 12:00UTC the typhoon-related death toll had climbed to 1,200, but it’s expected to rise sharply.
- Large scale devastation has occurred in the islands of Leyte and Samar, which is consistent with FIRE-EARTH Disaster Models.
- At least 36 provinces, out of a total of 80, have been severely affected.
- FIRE-EARTH Disaster Models estimate the total cost of damage at more than $5billion.
- At least 4.3 million people have been affected including about 350,000 who have lost their homes, according to the Philippines National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC).
- The Super Typhoon pummeled seven of the country’s 17 regions, causing large-scale power outages across much of the disaster areas.
- There are numerous reports of widespread looting across the disaster zone.
- Dozens of towns throughout the disaster zone have declared states of calamity.
- HAIYAN is currently targeting South China, moving close to Vietnam shoreline, according to revised projections suggested by several models. This would be a nightmare scenario for Vietnam because the typhoon could dump 4 to 6 times more rain over the country, and affect a much larger land area, than previously forecast, according to FIRE-EARTH Models.
- Chinese authorities have issued a level three emergency response as the recently downgraded Cat 2 typhoon approaches southern China.
FIRE-EARTH Models show storm surges of up to 20 meters high, generated by the Super Typhoon, striking coastal areas in the Bicol Peninsula. SEE
[NOTE: To those reporters who have difficulty understanding the basic mechanics of tsunamis: The height of tsunamis are governed by at least two major factors, in this case, (i) the initial height of the storm surge, and (ii) the geographical characteristics of the attack area. This is best described by Diposaptono et al in their paper Impacts of the 2011 East Japan tsunami in the Papua region, Indonesia: field observation data and numerical analyses – Geophysical Journal International, Volume 194, Issue 3, p.1625-1639.
… the impacts of the 2011 East Japan tsunami in Yos Sudarso Bay, Papua, Indonesia. Although the far-field tsunami had a height of 0.8 m measured at a tide gauge inside the small U-shaped bay, it severely damaged four villages scattered along the bay. Detailed numerical analysis was carried out to explain the damages. We used a well-verified source model in the near- and far-field cases to model the propagation of the tsunami southward in the Pacific until reaching Papua Island, Indonesia. The numerical analyses demonstrate two causes of damage in the bay: the maximum tsunami velocity (3.5 m s-1) floated the houses in the villages of Tobati and Enggros and caused them to collapse, and water trapped by the hook-shaped peninsula amplified the tsunami height at the Holtekamp and Hanurata.
Extent of the Devastation
“From a helicopter, you can see the extent of devastation. From the shore and moving a kilometer inland, there are no structures standing. It was like a tsunami,” said Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas.
“The dead are on the streets, they are in their houses, they are under the debris, they are everywhere,” said Tecson John Lim, a Tacloban city administrator.
“I have never seen such damage in my life,” said Capt John Andrews, deputy director general of the Civil Aviation Authority in the Philippines. I saw “utter destruction.”
“At the airport, there’s actually no structure left standing except the walls,” he told reporters.
Bohol Island Earthquake Disaster Update
Meantime, the following disaster update has been issued for the M7.2 earthquake that struck Bohol Island on October 15 2013.
- Number of people killed: 195 + (12 others missing, presumed dead)
- Injuries: 651
- About 350,000 people have been displaced.
The earthquake triggered massive landslides causing extensive damage to housing, hospitals, schools, infrastructure and utilities, with more than 53,300 houses severely damaged or destroyed.
More details to follow…
This post will be updated throughout Sunday.
Related Links
Fire Earth 