Typhoon Haiyan Survivors Remain Desperate
November 14, 2013
A U.S. aircraft carrier and two escort cruisers arrived today off the Philippines coast to help relieve the suffering of the survivors of Typhoon Haiyan. One of the strongest storms in recorded history, Haiyan smashed into the central Philippines on November 8 with winds approaching 200 miles (320 kilometers) per hour and storm surges 40 feet (12 meters) in height. The USS George Washington, with a crew of 5,000 sailors, will provide a platform for helicopters to move supplies. The carrier is moored off the east coast of Samar Island, which took a direct hit from the storm. Other U.S. Navy vessels are expected to arrive within a week.
Even as an enormous global aid effort gathers momentum and relief supplies begin arriving, survivors remain desperate for food and water and medical supplies. Valerie Amos, the top United Nations (UN) relief coordinator in the Philippines is pleading for more than $300 million in immediate emergency aid. “There has been a lot of commentary that relief is not moving as fast as it should be,” Praveen Agrawal, the World Food Program’s Philippines representative and country director told the BBC: “The reality on the ground is there is such a level of devastation” that all relief efforts are inadequate by comparison.
![Philippines](http://www.worldbookonline.com/contents/common-content/wbe-content/mp/lg/mp000187.gif)
Typhoon Haiyan devastated Samar and Leyte islands on November 8. (World Book map; map data © MapQuest.com, Inc.)
The mayor of the nearly destroyed city of Tacloban, Alfred S. Romualdez, yesterday urged residents to flee and, if possible, find shelter with relatives. He stated that local authorities were simply unable to provide enough food and water or maintain law and order. The first attempt by Tacloban authorities to conduct a mass burial was thwarted yesterday by armed looters whose gunfire forced a convoy of trucks carrying corpses to turn back as it approached the city limits. In Alangalang, a city in Leyte province, eight people were killed yesterday in a stampede when thousands of Haiyan survivors stormed a government-owned warehouse seeking food. The mob carried away more than 100,000 sacks of rice.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has announced that more than 1 million farmers have been impacted by Typhoon Haiyan. The storm wrecked hundreds of thousands of acres of rice. The area’s sugar cane crop is also lost. FAO official Jeff Tschirley told the BBC, “The sugar cane fields can be recovered relatively well even if the harvest is lost. But numerous coconut plantations have been completely flattened, and with coconuts you are looking at multiple years to recover the productivity.” The Philippines is the world’s largest producer of coconut oil, a major source of foreign currency.
Haiyan also destroyed hundreds of fishing villages, including boats and gear, severely affecting the region’s fishing industry. The FAO is asking for $24 million for immediate interventions in fisheries and agriculture as part of the UN appeal.