CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – Pres. Aquino’s home province of Tarlac, which bore the direct brunt of Typhoon Santi, is now under a state of calamity amid projections of significant devastation it sustained.
“Santi was the first typhoon to hit the province in two decades,” the Tarlac Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (PDRRMC) noted in its report. Reports on damages were still being compiled yesterday and partial figures were not immediately available.
The PDRRMC also said two persons were killed in the province during Santi’s onslaught. They were identified as Raymond Samson , 7, and Rachel Samson, 8, of Concepcion town. Both were pinned down by a mango tree.
The report said electric power still had to be restored in some parts of the province. It said that while linemen and utility crews were restoring power, Tarlac Electric Cooperative 3 (Tarelco 3) officials were reported to have said it would take several days to rehabilitate the electric system in towns within the third district where about 35 electric posts were felled by the typhoon.
In Tarlac’s first and second districts under Tarelco I, however, power was restored Saturday night.
The PDRRMC also reported that all major thoroughfares in Tarlac were reported already passable after debris that littered them were cleared by the DPWH, Army and PNP. The PDRRMC said that despite damage to local crops, Tarlac still has a buffer stock of 30,000 sacks of rice and 70,000 bags of palay enough for the consumption of folk in the province for eight days.
