Denying Demise

With the exit and dissipation of Typhoon Ompong (international name Mangkhut), the
Philippines is now in relative safety, only bearing with a confirmed death toll of only 74 people
so far, a number that could have been much higher considering the circumstances, but have been
cancelled out by the precautions made by our nation.
On September 5, the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JWTC) spotted a tropical
disturbance near the International Dateline. The tropical disturbance had developed into a
tropical depression on September 7 continuing to intensify into a tropical storm, tagged as
Mangkhut. The tropical storm reached typhoon strength by September 10, only being marked as
a Category-2 typhoon by JWTC as it approached Rota, Guam. The typhoon had sped up
exponentially soon to making landfall on Rota, causing a disheartening amount of damage.
Fortunately, there were no fatalities.
This gave the Philippines ample time to prepare for the typhoon for it was headed directly
towards Luzon. Typhoon Ompong reaches its peak intensity on September 12, which prompted
PAGASA to hoist tropical cyclone warning signals as early as September 13. Forced evacuations
were implemented in the regions expecting direct impact that could be severely affected by
Ompong. Class suspensions were announced, emergency response teams were placed on
standby, and relief goods were prepared all in advance.
These precautions made by the different government agencies were the best possible
responses made to prepare for the oncoming storm. Ompong had quickly become the world’s
strongest storm within this year reaching a peak strength of 285kph sustained for 1 minute and
205kph sustained for 10 minutes. Typhoon Ompong can be comparable to Yolanda to some
extent, as both of them are super typhoons with nearly similar average wind strength, speed,
gustiness, and the predicted height of a storm surge; which was a heavy situation in the case of
Yolanda; for one, the people had underestimated its strength because of the clear skies the day
before; and for another, the people did not fully understand the concept of storm surges and how
destructive they could be.
Despite typhoon Ompong being as huge as 1,010km in diameter (400km larger than
Yolanda), we’ve fortunately only seen 74 casualties in comparison to 2013’s 6,340 confirmed
deaths. The surprisingly advanced preparation and precautions taken by our country has
effectively saved the lives of thousands of people in the path of Ompong’s wrath. Thankfully,
our country has definitely seen the improvement in the Philippines’ response plans.
Whether or not this increased alertness came from Typhoon Yolanda is irrelevant. For the
safety and protection of our people must be the top priority of our nation despite the seemingly
excessive preparations made. There is no harm in being overprepared, especially when compared
to being underprepared, which could lead to lives lost for the incompetence of the authorities.