Calamity strikes Batangas anew as Rolly makes 4th landfall

BATANGAS CITY, Batangas, Philippines — Water mixed with mud from a swollen creek submerged houses, eateries and a maternity clinic in a subdivision here shortly after Typhoon Rolly (international name: Goni) made its fourth landfall in the adjacent town of Lobo in Batangas province late afternoon Sunday.

In a matter of hours, families preparing for dinner clambered up the second floor of their homes or to neighbors’ rooftops, leaving them no time to salvage their household appliances from the rampaging water.

“We were terrified. It was only (ankle-deep) then all of a sudden lampas-tao na (more than the average person’s height),” said JR Dagos, 29, on Monday as he tiptoed through broken liquor bottles that fell off the shelves in his family’s store.

Dagos said the family also lost five sacks of rice and 40 packs of powdered soap, among other goods left wet and dirty after the deluge.

Cars that residents normally parked in the slightly elevated basketball court were damaged by floodwater that reached as high as 3 meters.

Darryl Maningsong, 59, said his six fighting cocks drowned when floods struck Tierra Verde, a middle-income subdivision of about 500 households, in Barangay Pallocan West here.

Floods also hit Barangay San Isidro and swept at least two cars down the creek. Portions of the creek embankment had eroded, taking down with it a concrete facade of a vulcanizing shop.

Villagers sent out distress calls, prompting the police and firefighters to deploy lifelines in a rope rescue that lasted past midnight, said Mat Castro, the city’s deputy fire marshal.

The Philippine Coast Guard also sent rubber boats to ferry residents to a nearby mall and to evacuation centers.

Susan Calado said she had to climb over a wall to reach the neighbor’s roof and stayed there until help came. “It took me three attempts to climb because I was heavy. It was really a do or die (situation),” she said.

CLEANUP Residents of Tierra Verde subdivision in Batangas City start cleaning up their mud-soaked homes on Monday morning after floodwaters that submerged their community on Sunday receded. —MARIANNE BERMUDEZ

Eerie silence

But Calado, who lost several ornamental plants she was selling, could not recall any loud pleas for help but only an “eerie silence” in the neighborhood “because everybody was so shocked.”

Relatives Delfin and Jojo Dres said Rolly was “the worst we’ve had,” as sleepless and hungry residents on Monday shoveled and flushed away the mud that began to cake on their floor.

In a government briefing, Gov. Hermilando Mandanas on Monday said it was the fourth major calamity that struck the province this year starting with the eruption of Taal Volcano, followed by the coronavirus pandemic and last week’s Typhoon “Quinta.”

Batangas was recently placed under a state of calamity due to Quinta that left more than P1 billion in agriculture, infrastructure and property damage in the province, he said.

The Regional Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (RDRRMC) in Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) said 2,889 families (11,683 people) in the region were displaced by the typhoon.

In Rizal province, fisherman Hipolito Añain of Binangonan town drowned when he tried to inspect fish cages in Laguna de Bay on Sunday morning, police said.

The RDRRMC in Mimaropa (Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon and Palawan) said the typhoon displaced 7,190 families (26,610 people) in Oriental, Mindoro, Occidental Mindoro, Romblon and Marinduque.

Rino Labay, Marinduque DRRM officer, said electricity was restored only in some parts of the capital Boac on Monday. Knee- to chest-deep floods were reported in the towns of Boac, Mogpog and Sta. Cruz after rivers overflowed, he said.