Manila: Rescuers struggled to help survivors on Sunday after a tropical storm battered southern Philippines in the dark of night, unleashing huge floods in two cities that killed more than 650 people and left hundreds more missing, officials said.
The Red Cross on Sunday said the death toll from the floods was now at 652 with 808 others missing.
A 20,000-strong military force has been mobilised in a huge rescue and relief operation in Mindanao, where the major ports of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan were worst hit.
Most of the dead were children and women, said Philippine Red Cross Secretary General Gwendolyn Pang, warning that the numbers could climb further.
"It's difficult to be certain on those missing," Gwendolyn Pang, secretary-general of the PNRC, told media. "The floods washed out whole houses and families inside. It's possible entire families are dead and no one is reporting them missing."
Benito Ramos, National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) chief, said heavy rains caused flashfloods in the Mindanao cities of Iligan and Cagayan de Oro.
Footage aired by the GMA Network showed massive flooding in the two cities, as residents were awakened by the raging floodwaters that tore through the streets and into their homes.
The intensity of the rainfall and the ferocity of the floodwaters caught people off guard as the weather agency had raised the storm warning from Category 1 to 2 only a few hours before it struck.
Tropical storm Washi (called Sendong in the Philippines) was packing winds at 60-100km/h and 10-25mm of rainfall per hour when it slammed parts of Mindanao on Friday evening.
Philippines Red Cross secretary-general Gwen Pang said the latest toll was based on a body count at funeral parlours.
Rescue operations
Rescue operations for the missing continued late into the night on Saturday, according to Col Eugene Osias, of the army's 4th Infantry Batallion.
Iligan City Mayor, Lawrence Cruz, in an interview aired by the Bombo Radyo station, said it was the first time that his city had experienced a flash flood of such magnitude.
Scenes of vehicles piled one on top of the other were seen in the affected areas of Iligan and Cagayan de Oro cities.
Cruz said in some parts of the cities, the level of floodwater had submerged even rooftops. "What happened to us is disheartening," he said in Filipino.
He said he had not expected the rains to be so ferocious.
Rescued by cargo ship
In Cagayan de Oro, Carmelita Pulosan, 42, said she and eight family members and neighbours survived by sitting on top of the tin roof of their house as it drifted miles into the open sea after floodwaters swept through their village. They were rescued by a passing cargo ship.
"There was a deafening sound followed by a rush of water. We found ourselves in the river and the current took us out to the sea," Pulosan said. "The current was very strong." Only one 3-storey building was left standing in their village, Pulosan said.
With input from agencies
