Typhoon Fung-wong nears super strength, menacing an already storm-stricken Philippines
By Laura Sharman, CNN
(CNN) — A second typhoon in a week is churning toward the Philippines, with residents in its path warned to flee the looming destructive winds and life-threatening storm surges.
Fung-wong, known locally as Uwan, follows on the heels of Typhoon Kalmaegi, which killed almost 200 people in the central part of the archipelago nation, as well as five people in Vietnam.
Forecasters are now warning that the latest storm could strengthen into a super typhoon before making landfall on the eastern coast on Sunday.
Fung-wong’s massive circulation, spanning 1,500 km (932 miles), is already lashing parts of the region with heavy rain and winds, said forecaster Benison Estareja from the country’s meteorological agency PAGASA, according to Reuters.
“It can cover almost the entire country,” Estareja said.
On Saturday morning, Fung-wong barreled across the Philippine Sea with sustained winds of 140 kph (87 mph) and gusts up to 170 kph (106 mph).
PAGASA urged residents in low-lying and coastal areas to evacuate to higher ground and suspend all marine activities, as the agency warned of violent winds and destructive storm surges in Luzon – the nation’s most populous island, home to the capital Manila – as well as the Visayas islands and Siargao, known as the country’s surfing capital.
Several airlines, including Philippine Airlines, have canceled flights, according to the Philippines’ Civil Aviation Authority.
Weather agencies upgraded Fung-wong to a typhoon on Friday evening, just hours after downgrading Kalmaegi.
The Philippines is no stranger to typhoons, and Fung-wong is the 21st named storm to impact the country this year, according to local officials.
No pause for relief
Its predecessor Kalmaegi left a trail of death and devastation as it tore through the central Philippines on Tuesday, reducing entire neighborhoods to rubble and displacing tens of thousands of people. At least 188 people were killed, most in Cebu province, a tourist hotspot, local authorities said.
Though not the strongest storm to hit, it was slow-moving and dumped huge volumes of water over highly populated areas. Officials said most people died from drowning.
Its impact was worsened by clogged waterways in an already flood-prone area, and an apparent lack of understanding of early warnings, Bernardo Rafaelito Alejandro IV, deputy administrator for the Philippines Office of Civil Defense, told local media.
The Philippines is one of Asia’s most flood-prone countries but this year it has also been mired in a massive corruption scandal involving flood control projects that have brought thousands of protesters onto the streets.
Dozens of legislators, senators and construction companies have been accused of receiving kickbacks with money intended for thousands of flood control projects.
Scientists have long warned the human-caused climate crisis – for which industrialized nations bear greater historical responsibility – has only exacerbated the scale and intensity of regional storms that disproportionately impact populations in the Global South.
The western Pacific is the most active tropical basin on Earth but global ocean temperatures have been at record levels for each of the last eight years.
Hotter oceans, fueled by human-caused global warming, provide ample energy for storms to strengthen.
The climate crisis is supercharging rainfall events as warmer air can hold more moisture, which it then wrings out over towns, cities and communities, as it already has this week in Southeast Asia.
The-CNN-Wire
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