The Philippines canceled flights and shipping as it braced for super typhoon Doksuri, which is expected to impact the north of the nation before heading to Taiwan and China.
(Bloomberg) — The Philippines canceled flights and shipping as it braced for super typhoon Doksuri, which is expected to impact the north of the nation before heading to Taiwan and China.
The super typhoon is barreling toward the Philippines with maximum winds of 185 kilometers per hour (115 miles per hour) and gusts of up to 230 kilometers, the Philippine weather bureau said Tuesday. The typhoon is moving northwest at 15 kph toward the rugged terrain of northern Luzon.
Areas in the north, including portions of Cagayan province, are under the second-highest of a five-tier wind-strength classification, and residents have been told to shelter in strong buildings.
Even if the storm doesn’t make landfall, its sheer size means it’s likely to bring rain and strong winds to the province, which has experienced massive flooding in the past. Cagayan produces rice and corn, and hosts an economic zone.
“We are asking the people to evacuate,” Zenart Villamar, spokesperson at the incident command center in Cagayan provincial government, said via phone. “We are not ruling out the possibility of flooding but for now we are monitoring the seashore.”
Philippine Airlines and Cebu Air Inc. canceled more than a dozen flights from today, they said on Facebook. Nearly 10,000 people, 75 vessels and over 1,800 rolling cargoes are stranded in various ports as of Tuesday morning, according to the nation’s coast guard.
The Philippines is expected to see the biggest impact from the storm from tonight to tomorrow. Doksuri is forecast to exit the Philippines on Thursday morning, state weather bureau Pagasa said. Outside the Philippines, it will cross the Taiwan Strait and make landfall in the vicinity of Fujian, China on Friday morning.
“I have specifically asked government ministries to prepare for the typhoon,” Taiwan’s Premier Chen Chien-jen said in a post on Facebook. “Let’s work together at the central and local levels to minimize the impact and damage,” he said, noting that Taiwan hasn’t seen a typhoon landfall for nearly four years.
The island’s government on Monday raised a sea warning and is expected to raise a land warning at 2:30 p.m. local time on Tuesday.
Taiwan, which on Monday started large-scale annual five-day military drills, canceled plans to use Fengnian airport on the east of the island due to safety concerns, according to the Ministry of National Defense. The air force had planned to use the civilian airport for takeoff and landing drills for the first time.
The typhoon is being watched closely in case it affects Taiwan’s largest LNG import terminal, Yung-An, or key oil refineries. The island is also home to plants making some of the world’s most advanced semiconductors.
China’s National Meteorological Center has issued a yellow alert for Doksuri, the second lowest alert in its four-tier system, while the Hong Kong Observatory said it will raise the lowest typhoon warning signal on Wednesday.
–With assistance from Cecilia Yap, Sing Yee Ong, Olivia Tam and Dominic Lau.
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