Typhoon Haiyan Worse than hell Economist November 16

Typhoon Haiyan “Worse than hell”

Economist , November 16, 2013 • Long accustomed to fearsome storms, floods and earthquakes, Filipinos are usually stoical in the face of natural disasters. Yet the sheer magnitude of the super-typhoon that ripped through the middle of the archipelago on November 8 th was unprecedented, with sustained winds of 250 kilometres per hour (160 mph). The scale of the damage left in its wake was shocking. President Benigno Aquino declared the devastation a “national calamity”.

• Some towns hit by the storm may never wholly recover. For now, questions are being asked about whether the country could have been better prepared, as well as what might be done to mitigate the impact of severe storms that whip in—recently, with greater frequency—off the Pacific Ocean. Many Filipinos note that this storm hit just as the latest round of UN-sponsored climate-change talks was getting under way in Warsaw in Poland. Their government insists that man-made climate change is heightening the risk of typhoons, but scientists are not so sure

• Villagers made homeless by the disaster line the main coastal highway that twists and turns from Cebu towards Daanbantayan, at the far northern end of Cebu island. Amid the devastation of felled trees, flattened crops, toppled power lines and houses blown away, children hold up crudely written cardboard signs: “Please Help”, “We Need Food”.

The Washington Post November 15, 2013 • A week after Typhoon Haiyan made landfall in the Philippines, the country's crisis is far from over, with perhaps thousands of dead still be counted, tens or hundreds of thousands of people displaced and basic services, including access to food, shut down in many areas. To help convey how and why the storm was so bad, here is a series of eight maps on Haiyan, its impact and the Philippines' crisis.

• The Philippines is a nation of islands, with long shorelines and many low-lying areas, and it is located in a part of the world where sea levels, sea temperatures and weather patterns are expected to be disproportionately altered by the effects of climate change. Other geographic features put the country and its 98 million people at extreme risk from climate change. A U. N. report ranked it as the third most-susceptible country in the world to climate change. This map breaks down that susceptibility, showing how 11 different regions can expect to be hammered by the different effects of our changing climate. Haiyan may not be directly attributable to climate change, but it demonstrates what makes the country so vulnerable to rising seas and accelerating winds.

BBC November 19, 2013

Woman in the wreckage of her home

Do you expect another major typhoon will strike the Philippines? A. Yes B. No C. Not certain yet