The Philippine Coast Guard, children are evacuated from a flooded area by coast guard personnel in Lucena, Quezon Province, amid heavy rain brought by tropical storm Ewiniar. A severe storm battered the Philippines' most populous island on May 26, dumping heavy rain and causing flooding that forced more than 8,000 people to flee their homes. - AFP
MANILA (Bloomberg): The first typhoon to enter the Philippines this year killed at least three people in the South-East Asian nation, further gaining strength as it heads to Japan.
A seven-month-old baby and two others died Sunday after they were hit by falling trees in Quezon, a province near the capital, the Philippine Daily Inquirer has reported.
Typhoon Ewiniar, locally known as Aghon, also left thousands without electricity as strong winds knocked down power lines and shut nine plants, adding to the 12 that have been inoperative prior to the storm, according to the Department of Energy.
The forced outage reduced power capacity by nearly 4,300 megawatts.
Packing maximum sustained winds of 140 kilometers (87 miles) per hour, Ewiniar is forecast to hit the northern provinces of Cagayan and Batanes by Tuesday before exiting Philippine waters early Thursday, the local weather bureau said.
It’s forecast to move towards the south of Japan, according to the Hong Kong Observatory.
The Philippines has an average of 20 tropical cyclones a year, making it one of the world’s worst-hit countries.
-- ©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
