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Praise God for some good news. The major roads between Baguio and the lowlands have reopened... though still not an easy drive. Baguio is 1 mile in elevation, even though less than 20 miles (straight-line distance) from the South China Sea. So roads are steep and windy. With landslides and chunks of the roads removed by the typhoon, there was simply no way in or out, except walking (and that was no easy thing either). But roads have reopened and meat, vegetables, and diesel fuel are again plentiful. However, there is still a great deal of devastation. We at DPDM had a difficult decision in how to help, since we were among those trapped in an area where supplies were limited. Our first response was to visit the worst landslide. Located in Puguis, La Trinidad (6 km from Baguio), it was a horror scene. A part of the mountain turned to mud and ripped through a road and down into a valley known as "Little Kibungan", ripping apart houses. Over 70 bodies have been found, and more are being searched for. The dead include family members of friends of ours (the friends are leaders of Asia Vision-STM). We spoke with the Rescue/Disaster crew leaders.Over 200 are digging there to find bodies, and return the community to some level of normalcy. These workers are students at the local police training school. They were conscripted to help. Some are at landslides... while others working to repen roads. Since this is not their normal job, they are not well equipped. A few have shovels, while others use their hands. They lack face masks, proper gloves, and other necessary equipment. They leave their school at 6am, and return at 7pm... working the whole time. We were able to supply a number of things for them, including gloves, water bottles, snacks, and vitamins. A local church supplied 40 shovels. We are looking into other things such as face masks. The sacrificial support of local businesses has made this possible. We are planning to do a disaster medical mission in La Trinidad. Looking into Camp Dangwa, or perhaps Tublay. Once again, the availability of adequate supplies of medicine in Baguio proves a bit of a challenge. Hope to update on this shortly. Of course, there is much more that needs to be done. Major flooding in Queen of Peace and City Camp area has done a great deal of damage to one of the poorest parts of Baguio. People who had so little before, now have even less. Other landslides have also occurred in the area... over 300 documented total deaths from this typhoon (with more likely to follow). Received word from the Naguilian area of La Union. We were planning to do a medical mission in Bagulin, La Union, but it had to be postponed due to road damage. The church where we were to do the mission was heavily flooded (several feet deep). An outlying building that was to be used for the medical mission was destroyed. At last count we were given, three were dead from Bagulin. Daramuangan (a place we have worked with in the past, and still doing some follow-on work) was hit with flooding and landslides. Crops were damaged by silting. In great need of food and clothing. Dagupan City in Pangasinan had major flooding. In fact much of Pangasinan did. Several dams released water to protect them... but this led to fast deep currents that overturned vehicles, destroyed bridges, and led to deaths. Thankfully, our team was texted last Thursday enroute to Baguio in time. If they had proceeded farther into Pangasinan, they may have been washed away by the flooding. Another ministry area, Tamuini, Isabela, had remarkably little damage. Some roofs destroyed, but considering that it was in the direct path of the typhoon, we are thankful that the people in this impoverished community did not suffer more.
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