BAGUIO, Philippines – American military helicopters ferried tons
of aid Sunday to a northern Philippine mountain region facing
shortages of food, gasoline and coffins after back-to-back typhoons
killed more than 600 in the country.
Four Marine CH-46 helicopters flew to Baguio city, which along
with nearby provinces was devastated by storm-triggered mudslides
that have blocked three key access roads to the area, isolating the
upland region in recent days.
Workers with bulldozers partly cleared one road Sunday, allowing
cars but not relief trucks to pass, disaster-response agency
spokesman Lt. Col. Ernesto Torres said.
The U.S. military was responding to a request from the
Philippines to help deal with the aftermath of two major storms
since Sept. 26. Tropical Depression Parma blew out of the country's
mountainous north late Saturday, allowing U.S. troops to start
airlifting food aid to Baguio.
About 700 Marines and sailors were on hand to help out, said
Marine Capt. Jorge Escatell, a U.S. military spokesman.
The helicopters flew to northern San Fernando township, where
they picked up about 10 tons of food that were delivered to
Baguio.
The floods and landslides killed at least 53 people in Baguio, a
summer tourist destination 130 miles (210 kilometers) north of
Manila known for its cool climate. Rescuers continued to dig
through a huge mound of mud in Crescencia village in search of more
than 10 residents who were still missing, Baguio police chief
Agrifino Javier said.
While the weather has cleared, the city of more than 300,000
people faced dwindling food and gasoline supplies. President Gloria
Macapagal Arroyo flew in by helicopter Sunday to check the
situation.
"There is nearly zero gasoline supply now, and we're running low
on food," Javier told The Associated Press, adding many foreign
tourists were among those stranded in the city.
Gasoline was being rationed and residents have been urged to
calm after panic-buying emptied several stores of canned goods,
said disaster-response officer Olive Luces.
In nearby Benguet province, police and volunteer gold miners
pulled more bodies overnight from houses buried by mudslides late
Thursday and early Friday, bringing the province-wide death toll
from Parma to 175. At least 20 people remain missing, provincial
police chief Loreto Espineli said.
Most of the dead were recovered in a mountainside community
called Little Kibungan, where tons of mud and floodwaters buried or
swept away houses as people slept late Thursday after a week of
pounding rain, Espineli said.
Marsman Diang said he wept as he frantically dug into the mud
Friday for his five nieces and nephews in Little Kibungan. Four
were found dead, wrapped in a bedsheet. One was pulled out barely
breathing and did not make it to the hospital alive.
The children's father, Diang's brother, left to work in Japan
two months ago to raise money for the kids' education. "He couldn't
talk. I heard him weeping with his wife when I called to tell them
that their children were gone," Diang said.
Apart from shortage of gasoline, the province has run out of
coffins. Volunteers were busy making wooden coffins for six bodies
found in Benguet's capital town of La Trinidad, Espineli said.
Aside from delivering packs of sardines, bottled water and rice
in Baguio, American and Filipino forces also fanned out in
Pangasinan, a rice-producing province to its south, to help provide
medical treatment. Nearly all of Pangasinan was inundated by
flooding and water released from a major dam, but some areas
struggled back to normalcy Sunday.
"I see people drying up rice crop on the roadside. It's pretty
amazing to me and I think that's a good sign," Escatell told The
AP.
With large expanses of land still under water, officials said
damage to agriculture and infrastructure reached $312 million.
Troops from the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, based in
Okinawa, Japan, had just finished rescue and cleanup work around
Manila, which experienced the worst flooding in over 40 years after
Tropical Storm Ketsana dumped record rains Sept. 26. That disaster
displaced about 1 million people and killed 337 in the capital and
nearby provinces. More than 241,000 remain in evacuation
centers.
Then Typhoon Parma struck Oct. 3 and lingered as a tropical
depression for about a week before blowing away toward China, where
two people went missing Sunday after their fishing boat
capsized.
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Associated Press writers Jim Gomez in Manila and Gillian Wong in
Beijing contributed to this report.