13 missing in Camarines Norte floods
By Juan Escandor Jr.
Southern Luzon Bureau
First Posted 00:46:00 12/02/2008
Filed Under: Flood, Disasters (general), Regional authorities
DAET, CAMARINES NORTE – The Provincial Disaster Coordinating Council here reported 13 persons missing as of Monday afternoon due to the floods that hit seven of the 12 towns of Camarines Norte when rains continuously poured on Monday.
Earlier in the day, the PDCC reported five persons missing and 1,093 families displaced by floods. The five were identified as Ariel Marmol, Dindo Enova, Alfredo Lasini, Manolo Mabeza and Melchor Mabeza.
The additional eight persons on the list of missing are Mario Heraldo, Allen Villar, Edgar Vitalicio, Joel Ungog, Toton Pajaria, Joselito Sanchez, Felix Barba and Jimmy Barba.
The Philippine National Police, however, has placed the number of families displaced and relocated at the evacuation centers at 2,211 as of 10 a.m. Monday, while one unidentified fisherman from Paracale reportedly drowned.
Arnel S. Ferrer, provincial disaster coordinator, said the flood had also busted the main water pipe, which left the towns of Daet, San Vicente, Talisay, Basud, Mercedes, Vinzons and Labo without potable water supply.
This, he said, prompted the Department of Health to send here a water purifying equipment to augment the water needs of more than 200,000 residents in the seven towns.
Ferrer said the water purifying equipment was capable of immediately processing water from the river to augment the needs of the communities here.
Gov. Jesus Typoco Jr. has called on the national government to help in the relief and rehabilitation of the areas even as, he said, the provincial government was already initiating distribution of relief assistance to families in the evacuation centers.
Typoco said the provincial government would still wait for reports from the towns affected by floods to assess whether or not to declare a state of calamity for the whole province but, he said, the municipal governments can declare on their own a state of calamity.
He said five concrete and two hanging bridges in San Vicente town were destroyed and that alone would not be less than P30 million while their calamity fund only totaled P20 million.
Typoco said they had also deployed water lorries in several areas to distribute water to residents though, he admitted, it is not sustainable.
Mayor Stanley Alegre, of the most devastated town of San Vicente, said the rains that relentlessly poured since Friday had isolated five villages in his town.
Alegre said the runoff from the Mt. Labo had swollen the rivers in their town and as the debris clogged the waterways, the bridges broke down.
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