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PHILIPPINES-WEATHER-STORM
Four dead as storm sweeps through central Philippines
MANILA, Dec 29, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Four people were killed in landslides and
thousands of others evacuated from their homes after a storm swept through
the central Philippine islands on Saturday, officials said.
Three members of a family were buried in a landslide in Legazpi City
southeast of Manila while a woman was crushed by another landslide in Bulan
town as heavy rains brought by the storm loosened the earth, the government’s
office of civil defence said.
Almost 12,000 people were also evacuated from their homes in the Bicol
region after the low pressure area, locally named “Usman”, hit the eastern
side of the country on Saturday, the office said.
The weather disturbance, packing maximum winds of 65 kilometres (40 miles)
per hour, was charted as moving west across the central islands at 10
kilometres per hour and was expected to be over the South China Sea by
Sunday, the government weather station said.
Although Usman’s winds were not too powerful, it still brought heavy rains
that caused landslides and flooding in areas it traversed, the civil defence
office said.
An average of 20 typhoons and storms lash the Philippines each year,
killing hundreds of people.
The country’s deadliest storm on record is Super Typhoon Haiyan, which
left more than 7,350 people dead or missing across the central Philippines in
November 2013.
BSS/AFP/SSS/1502 hrs