DEVASTATING YOLANDA, NOT JUST A SUPER-TYPHOON....BUT THE FIRST MEGA TYPHOON EVER . . .

My family was busy preparing the incoming church wedding of my son Brian which was actually scheduled on November 8, the day a super-typhoon Yolanda was forcasted to hit Eastern Visayas. Being one of the Department Heads of the Municipality of Calubian, most of the primary sponsors of the wedding were also Department Heads including not less than the Local Chief Executive of the Municipality. That week starting November 4, the different heads had a series of meetings in preperation not for the wedding but for the incoming typhoon. Our mayor who is so knowledgeable in disaster preparation has taken the PAG-ASA forcast so seriously. We trace the probable path of the typhoon through the internet which is forcasted to directly hit the Municipality of Calubian. Our continued monitoring has made us decide to conduct a force evacuation especially to all households within the coastal areas. Even the incoming wedding of my son was postponed a week after since our caterer , the Lemon Grass Catering who is living in Palompon was so afraid to the probable effect of the typhoon.

A day before Yolanda struck Calubian, the disaster management team of Calubian had already made its final preparation. A composite team riding in a patrol car has made its final appeal to all coastal inhabitants to make a force evacuation since the typhoon was expected to hit Calubian in the morning of November 8. At Thursday night, the Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (MDRRMC) of the municipality of Calubian was on red alert making the ABC Hall as its Operation Center. Evacuaees in the different school buildings were monitored to identify the total number of evacuees.

At 6:00 AM of November 8, the wind had started blowing which I expected it was already the typhoon. I texted by bother Romy who is an employee of DOST Biliran if it was already Yolanda. But he warned me to be ready since the typhoon was so devastating that according to him the City of Tacloban was already turned into bits of pieces. Unfortunately, the typhoon had really hit Calubian that according to PAG-ASA forcaster, the typhoon was so behaved that it really followed its forcasted route. At 8 in the morning, we received an initial blow of the strongest wind I ever experienced in my entire life. The initial damages in our surroundings were the tumbling down of all the trees surrounding my house; mango, jackfruit, santol and many others. This happened that all the people inside the house became the living witness of how Yolanda devastated the environment. Below are some of the pictorials taken during and after the super typhoon hit Calubian;

The following photos showed evidence of the relief effort conducted by the Calubian LGU personnel who had been delivering relief goods to all the 53 barangays of the Municipality of Calubian. The goods were pouring in coming from different donors through the Department of Social Welfare and Devoelopment (DSWD). Among the private donors were the ABS-CBN through its Sagip Kapamilya food packs, the Heifer International, Phil who had given food packs to its Heifer Partner families and other various organizations.