Tropical Storm “Dodong” swirled out of the country yesterday but a new low pressure area has formed east of southern Mindanao, bringing rains over that southern region, weather bureau officials said.
As of 2 p.m. yesterday, the new weather disturbance was located 800 kilometers east of southern Mindanao.
With the exit of Dodong, the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) lifted all storm warning signals around the country.
Dodong (international name “Sarika”) was headed for Hong Kong.
As of 10 a.m. yesterday, it was 330 km northwest of Laoag City moving north northwest at 25 kph with maximum sustained winds of 65 kph.
By this morning, Dodong is expected to be 540 km northwest of Basco, Batanes.
The rains over the past few days, initially brought by the interconvergence zone and later by Dodong, caused floods that killed nine persons.
La Niña over
The Philippines has entered the rainy season, although Pagasa has also announced that La Niña is over. Near normal rainfall is expected in most parts of the country.
The La Niña weather phenomenon refers to the abnormal cooling of ocean surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific.
Pagasa forecast
In its 5 p.m. forecast yesterday, the weather bureau said Mindanao and the western sections of Luzon and the Visayas would experience mostly cloudy skies with scattered rainshowers and thunderstorms.
Eastern Mindanao might experience widespread rains that could trigger flash floods and landslides, it warned.
The rest of the country would have partly cloudy to cloudy skies with isolated rainshowers and thunderstorms, mostly in the afternoon or evening.