Over 300 people died after the powerful typhoon Rai hit the Philippines which flooded towns and destroyed homes across the country.
The typhoon left power and communication cable lines severed while displacing hundreds of thousands of people in the southern and the central regions of the Philippines.
“We are still assessing the damage, but it is huge,” Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana told reporters on Monday. “The first thing we are doing is address the food and water (supplies) and medical care of the injured.”
Lorenzana stated that the armed forces were summoned to deliver relief goods by using every asset available. He also sent more troops to the most damaged regions.
He also said Military airplanes and naval vessels were dispatched on Monday to carry aid to areas devastated by Typhoon Rai.
Maximum deaths were reported in the central region of the Visayas which is said to be one of the most popular tourist destinations of the country and the Caraga region in northeastern Mindanao.
Provincial governor Arthur Yap stated that “he feared the death toll could rise further, as a lack of mobile telephone links made it hard to gather information.”
The typhoon was termed Rai and was determined as a category 5 typhoon. It revived the memories of Typhoon Haiyan which hit the country back in 2013 and devastated the Philippines.
Typhoon Haiyan is termed as “one of the most powerful tropical cyclones ever recorded, which killed 6,300 people in the Philippines.”
According to the reports, typhoon Rai displaced more than 490,000 people in the country before it moved further towards the South China sea.
It destroyed everything that came in the way in the provinces of Leyte, Surigao del Norte, and Cebu.
The president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte visited the typhoon-stricken areas over the weekend while promising a relief fund of approximately 2 billion pesos ($40 million) to rebuild the country.
