Hundreds Feared Dead in Philippines

A passenger ferry, MV Princess of the Stars, capsized off the central Philippine island of Sibuyan.
MANILA, Philippines: June 23rd. (NY TIMES) — The death toll from the powerful typhoon that killed more than 100 people in the Philippines last weekend could rise sharply after a ferry carrying more than 700 passengers and crew members capsized in the central part of the island chain , officials said.

The Red Cross reported that at least 137 people had been killed in the hurricane, not including those confirmed dead after the ferry sinking. Glenn Rabonza, executive director of the National Disaster Coordinating Council, said casualty figures were difficult to confirm because of extremely bad weather that was hampering search and recovery operations. On Sunday, the coast guard said it had reached the spot near the island of Sibuyan where the passenger ferry, the Princess of the Stars, had capsized a day earlier.

Officials said they found no survivors apart from four passengers rescued earlier in the day. Officials said the bodies of four passengers had also been recovered earlier in the day. Nanette Tansingco, mayor of San Fernando, Sibuyan’s largest town, told DZMM radio on Sunday that witnesses had described “the boat upside down with a big hole in the hull.” She said island villagers had reported seeing slippers and other belongings washing ashore, and other witnesses offered similar accounts. One of the survivors, Jesus Gica, told a radio station that he saw passengers losing consciousness and children unable to wear their life vests. “Many of us jumped from the ship,” he said. “The waves were big.” He also said elderly people, unable to escape, had been trapped underneath the sunken ferry.

Dozens of relatives of the passengers went to the ferry company’s office in Manila, demanding to know what happened to their loved ones. “I’m very worried,” Felino Farionin told The Associated Press. “I need to know what happened to my family.” He said his wife, son and in-laws were on the ferry. According to the government, the ferry was carrying 702 passengers, 45 of them children and infants, and 121 crew members.

The typhoon, Fengshen, made landfall on Saturday and battered several provinces. Its wind and rain knocked down power lines in the capital and elsewhere, caused landslides and capsized small boats. Fengshen, its winds at more than 90 miles per hour, caused more destruction in the northern Philippines but was headed out of the country on Sunday afternoon, weather officials said. The bad weather hampered efforts to locate the Princess of the Stars and its passengers, coast guard officials said. “They haven’t seen anyone,” Lt. Senior Grade Arman Balilo, a spokesman for the coast guard, told The Associated Press. “They’re scouring the area. They’re studying the direction of the waves to determine where survivors may have drifted.” Officials were checking reports that some people reached a nearby island and that a raft was spotted off another, said a coast guard spokesman, Cmdr. Antonio Cuasito, The Associated Press reported. “We can only pray that there are many survivors so we can reduce the number of casualties,” he said.

President Gloria Arroyo, who is in the United States for a state visit, scolded coast guard officials during a teleconference on Sunday for allowing the ferry to sail despite warnings about the typhoon. She ordered government agencies to coordinate rescue and relief efforts. The coast guard said the Princess of the Stars was allowed to leave Manila on Friday evening for Cebu, a city in the central Philippines, because the storm had not yet made landfall. Coast guard officials said the ferry should have been big enough to sail and that a warning issued earlier on Saturday barred only small boats from traveling. In Iloilo Province, in the central Philippines, the governor, Neil Tupaz, reported that 59 people had died and that more than two dozen others were missing. “Iloilo is like an ocean,” Mr. Tupaz said in a radio interview. Officials said tens of thousands of displaced residents were moved to evacuation centers. Flights were canceled and Monday classes suspended. Each year, about 20 typhoons slam into the Philippines, an archipelago bordering the Pacitic in the path of the storm systems.
By CARLOS CONDE
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