Floods submerge towns in Laguna, Cavite

SAN PEDRO, Laguna-The incessant rains that began late Sunday evening submerged several municipalities in Laguna, Cavite, and Rizal provinces, forcing hundreds of families to flee their homes and rendering major thoroughfares impassable.

The Laguna Lake Development Authority (LLDA) is keeping watch of the lake water level that rose overnight from 11.6 meters to 12.1 meters, as of early Monday.

The lake’s critical or the maximum annual level is 12.5 meters, according to LLDA hyrdrologist and engineer Emil Hernandez.

“(Going) beyond this level would mean that the lake (exceeded) its volume capacity. (This) may trigger more than a month-long lakeshore flooding like what happened after (typhoon) Ondoy (in 2009) and the habagat (monsoon rains) in 2012,” he said.

In Laguna, knee to waist-deep flood hit several villages hampering rescue operations of the residents trapped inside their homes.

“The water is coming down from the upland area and from the rising rivers. Do you hear that? That’s the sound of the rampaging flood. We could not use our (police) mobile cars anymore. We had to do the rescue by foot now,” said San Pedro police chief Supt. Chito Bersaluna, in a phone interview.

As of 8 a.m., 112 families were evacuated from Barangays (villages) Landayan (65 families), Cuyab (12 families), San Roque (35 families) to the old municipal hall building of San Pedro. Among them were two women, who recently just gave birth, he said.

Bersaluna said three private vehicles were swept away by the flood in Camella Homes in Barangay San Antonio, although no one was inside the vehicles. A flashflood was also reported in the Southwoods Exit as well as in other portions of the South Luzon Expressway Monday morning.

Hit by waist-deep flood were portions of Biñan City and the villages of Pook, Balibago,  Dila and Macabling in Sta. Rosa City, both in Laguna; as well as parts of Carmona in Cavite, according to Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, Quezon) Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council director Vicente Tomazar.

Brownouts were also reported in some parts of San Pedro and Sta. Rosa City,
he said.