Heavy rains hit Manila, killing at least 9

MANILA, Philippines – Relentless rains submerged half of the sprawling Philippine capital, triggered a landslide that killed nine people and sent emergency crews scrambling Tuesday to rescue tens of thousands of residents who called media outlets pleading for help.

By Aaron Favila, AP

A man carries a girl on his shoulders as they cross a flooded area in Quezon City, north of Manila.

By Aaron Favila, AP

A man carries a girl on his shoulders as they cross a flooded area in Quezon City, north of Manila.

The deluge, the worst since 2009 when hundreds died in rampaging flash floods, was set off by the seasonal monsoon that overflowed major dams and rivers in Manila and surrounding provinces.

The capital and other parts of the country already were saturated from last week's Typhoon Saola, which battered Manila and the north for several days before blowing away Friday. That storm was responsible for at least 53 deaths.

"It's like a water world," said Benito Ramos, head of the government's disaster response agency. He said the rains flooded 50 percent of metropolitan Manila on Monday evening, and about 30 percent remained under waist- or neck-deep waters Tuesday.

He urged residents in areas prone to landslides and floods to stay in evacuation centers. Because the soil is saturated, even a little rain could be dangerous, he added.

"Now that it's getting dark, I would like to repeat, if the rains are heavy you should be at the evacuation centers," he said, warning that rescue operations are more difficult at night and could put responders at risk.

Manila's weather bureau said a tropical storm off eastern China had intensified monsoon rains in the Philippines, which were forecast to last until Thursday.

In Manila's suburban Quezon City, a landslide hit a row of shanties perched below a hill, burying nine people, according to Ramos.

Army troops and police dug frantically to save those buried, including four children, as surviving relatives and neighbors wept. All the victims were recovered, some whose bodies were found near an entombed shanty's door as they apparently tried to flee.

"My wife, children and grandchild are down there," a drenched Jessie Bailon told The Associated Press while watching rescuers dig into a muddy mound where his shanty once stood.

National police chief Nicanor Bartolome went to the scene and ordered all other slum dwellers to be evacuated from the still-soggy area.

TV footage showed rescuers dangling on ropes to bring children and other residents to safety from flooded houses across the city. Many residents trapped in their homes called radio and TV stations desperately asking for help.

"We need to be rescued," Josephine Cruz told DZMM radio as water rose around her house in Quezon City, saying she was trapped in her two-story house with 11 other people, including her 83-year-old mother. "We can't get out because the floodwaters are now higher than people."

ABC-CBN TV network reported receiving frantic calls from people whose relatives were trapped in the deluge, many without food since Tuesday morning. They included a pregnant woman with a baby who wanted to be rescued from a roof and about 55 people who scrambled to the third floor of a Quezon city house as water rose below them.

Vehicles and even heavy trucks struggled to navigate water-clogged roads, where hundreds of thousands of commuters were stranded. Many cars were stuck in the muddy waters.

The government suspended work and classes Tuesday and Wednesday. Some shopping malls opened with limited grocery supplies that were quickly picked up by shoppers waiting in long lines.

The La Mesa dam, which supplies water to the capital of 12 million people, spilled excess water early Tuesday into the rivers flowing into Quezon City, as well as the neighborhoods of Malabon, Valenzuela and Caloocan, where several villages were submerged.

Along the swollen Marikina River, nearly 20,000 residents have been moved away from the riverbanks but many others asked to be rescued. Mayor Del de Guzman pleaded for patience and said overwhelmed rescue teams would try to reach everyone.

President Benigno Aquino III called an emergency meeting of Cabinet officials and disaster-response agencies. He ordered officials to make sure all residents were accounted for in flooded villages and discussed how flooded hospitals could be helped in case they were hit by power outages.

The Philippine Stock Exchange in the flooded financial district of Makati was closed. Also closed was the U.S. Embassy along Manila Bay in the historic old city, which was flooded last week when a storm surge pushed the water over the seawall.

In 2009, massive flooding spawned by a typhoon devastated Manila and surrounding areas, killing hundreds. The state weather bureau said that the current flooding was not as severe and that the weather may start to improve later this week.

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Wyo. tornado injures at least one

A tornado touched down this afternoon in southeastern Wyoming, causing at least one injury, according to news reports.

Update at 7:35 p.m. ET: One person was treated at Platte County Memorial Hospital in Wheatland for an unspecified minor injury, the Wyoming Tribune-Eagle says.

The twister lasted on and off for about an hour before dissipating northeast of Chugwater, a meteorologist told the Cheyenne paper.

Golf-ball-size hail was reported around Wheatland, with 2-inch hail in Laramie, the National Weather Service says.

Several tornado touchdowns from a separate storm were reported north of Cheyenne.

Original post: A tornado touched down in southeastern Wyoming this afternoon, causing at least one injury, according to news reports from the Equality State.

The quarter-mile-wide twister hit east of Wheatland about 3:15 p.m. MT (5:15 p.m. ET) and moved southeast across I-25, a National Weather Service meteorologist told the Casper Star-Tribune. The town of 3,500, in Platte County, is 70 miles north of Cheyenne.

The Platte County emergency coordinator told the Star-Tribune there were multiple injuries. A Wheatland Police dispatcher told K2-TV that one injury was confirmed and that police were checking homes for other injuries.

Structural damage was reported, but the location and extent were not yet clear, K2 says.

A storm chaser tweeted this photo of the funnel cloud.

Violent weather was moving across the Plains region. In Colorado, Denver and 12 other counties are under a tornado warning until 8 p.m. MT (10 p.m. ET), the Denver Post says.

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Storms kill at least two in Alabama (Reuters)

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (Reuters) – Search and rescue team combed through debris in Alabama after powerful thunderstorms pummeled the state early Monday, killing at least two people and leaving heavy damage just hours after tornadoes struck portions of Arkansas.

Alabama Governor Robert Bentley declared a state of emergency after the predawn storms struck the Birmingham area, with the towns of Center Point and Trussville just to the northeast of the city hit particularly hard.

Two people were confirmed dead, according to Pat Curry, Jefferson County's chief deputy coroner, one in Clay, a city of roughly 10,000 people, and another in the western part of the county.

Earlier, an emergency management official had reported three deaths.

"We have major, major damage," said Bob Ammons, a Jefferson County Emergency Management Agency official, referring to Center Point, Trussville and some unincorporated areas of the county.

About 100 people were treated for injuries, said Jefferson County EMA spokesman Mark Kelly.

Last April, massive tornadoes tore through Alabama killing more than 240 people including 64 fatalities in the Jefferson and Tuscaloosa areas.

On Monday, in St. Clair County, Alabama, spokeswoman Katie Reese said a local fire department estimated some 36 homes were damaged, and some of them were destroyed.

The possibility for sporadic thunderstorms in the region lingered, according to AccuWeather.com senior meteorologist Henry Margusity, but overall the severe weather was calming down.

Clean-up and recovery efforts were under way across Alabama Monday afternoon.

Food safety inspectors had been dispatched to assess damage and power outages at retail food establishments, state officials said, adding that any compromised products would be taken off shelves.

Search and rescue efforts were ongoing, according to Matt Angelo of the Center Point fire department. The injury count in that area northeast of Birmingham remained at about 12, he said.

At nearby Parkway Veterinary Clinic animals were being transported to a safe location after the structure sustained a direct hit during the storm, a spokeswoman said.

Earlier, rescue crews were dispatched to investigate reports of an overturned mobile home with people trapped inside, said Debbie Orange, city clerk for the city of Clanton, about midway between Birmingham and Montgomery. No injuries could be confirmed.

A preliminary report from the weather service's storm prediction center indicated a radio station in Clanton, Alabama was destroyed and a 302-foot transmission tower "toppled" due to the severe weather.

A tornado is suspected, but not yet confirmed, in the radio station destruction, according to the National Weather Service.

In Tennessee, the worst storm damage was in the middle of the state, with downed trees and power lines. In western Tennessee, structural damage resulted from winds whipping up to 65 miles per hour, meteorologists said.

These were the latest in a series of powerful January storms to have torn through the Southeast.

On Sunday, twisters downed trees and powerlines in Arkansas leaving thousands without power.

A tornado ripped into an area outside of Fordyce, some 70 miles south of state capital Little Rock, damaging houses and felling trees and power lines as it moved, according to Accuweather.com.

The National Weather Service in Little Rock rated the Fordyce area tornado as an EF2, on a scale that ranges from EF0 to EF5, the most severe. The town of just under 5,000 people was one of the hardest hit areas in a series of storms that struck Arkansas Sunday night.

Significant damage occurred to houses northwest of the small town, the city's country club and a set of transmission towers, it said in a statement.

The weather service has reported as many as eight possible tornadoes may have touched down Sunday night in Arkansas, which was pelted by soft-ball sized hailstones and buffeted by winds gusting up to 70 miles per hour.

By Monday, less than 8,000 customers across Arkansas were still without power, according to utility provider Entergy Arkansas, Inc.

(Additional reporting by Tim Ghianni in Nashville, Suzi Parker in Little Rock and Kelli Dugan in Mobile, Alabama; Writing by Dan Burns and Lauren Keiper; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Greg McCune)

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Flash floods kill at least 450 in Philippines (AP)

MANILA, Philippines – Flash floods devastated a southern Philippines region unaccustomed to serious storms, killing at least 450 people while they slept, rousting hundreds of others to their rooftops and turning two coastal cities into muddy, debris-filled waterways that were strewn with overturned vehicles and toppled trees.

With nearly 300 people missing, Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin and top military officials were to fly to the worst-hit city of Cagayan de Oro on Sunday to help oversee search-and-rescue efforts and deal with thousands of displaced villagers, as the weather began to clear and floodwaters receded. Among the items urgently needed are coffins and body bags, said Benito Ramos, who heads the government's disaster-response agency.

"It's overwhelming. We didn't expect these many dead," Ramos said.

Army officers reported unidentified bodies piled up in morgues in Cagayan de Oro city, where electricity was restored in some areas, although the city of more than 500,000 people remained without tap water.

Most of the victims were asleep Friday night when raging floodwaters cascaded from the mountains after 12 hours of rain from a late-season tropical storm in the southern Mindanao region. The region is unaccustomed to the typhoons that are common elsewhere in the archipelago.

Ayi Hernandez, a former congressman, said he and his family were resting in their home in Cagayan de Oro late Friday when they heard a loud "swooshing sound" and water quickly rose ankle-deep inside. He decided to evacuate to a neighbor's two-story house.

"It was a good thing, because in less than an hour the water rose to about 11 feet (3.3 meters)," filling his home up to the ceiling, he said.

At least 450 people were killed in the floods, Philippine Red Cross Secretary General Gwen Pang and other officials said. At least 229 died in Cagayan de Oro and 144 in nearby Iligan, which has more than 300,000 residents. The rest died in several other southern and central provinces, Pang said.

Many of the bodies were unclaimed after nearly 24 hours, suggesting that entire families had died, she said.

The Office of Civil Defense said 274 people were missing, but Ramos said the number would likely rise as more field reports come in. So far, 437 people have been rescued.

Cagayan de Oro and Iligan were filled with scenes of destruction and desperation.

A swollen river sent floodwaters gushing through neighborhoods that do not usually experience flooding. A man floated in an inner tube in muddy water littered with plastic buckets, pieces of wood and other debris. Ten people in one home stood on a sloping roof, waiting for rescuers even as water still flooded the lower floors.

Local television footage showed muddy water rushing in the streets, sweeping away all sorts of debris. Thick layers of mud coated streets where the waters had subsided. One car was thrown over a concrete fence and others were crushed and piled in a flooded canal.

Ramos attributed the high casualties in Mindanao "partly to the complacency of people because they are not in the usual path of storms" despite four days of warnings by officials that one was approaching.

Thousands of soldiers backed up by hundreds of local police, reservists, coast guard officers and civilian volunteers were mobilized for rescue efforts, but they were hampered by the flooded-out roads and lack of electricity.

The missing included prominent Filipino radio broadcaster Enie Alsonado, who was swept away while trying to save his neighbors, Iligan Mayor Lawrence Cruz said.

Authorities recovered bodies from the mud after the water subsided. Parts of concrete walls and roofs, toppled vehicles and other debris littered the streets.

Rescuers in boats rushed offshore to save people swept out to sea. In Misamis Oriental province, 60 people were plucked from the ocean off El Salvador city, about six miles (10 kilometers) northwest of Cagayan de Oro, said disaster official Teddy Sabuga-a.

Cruz said the Philippine coast guard and other rescuers were scouring the waters off Iligan for survivors or bodies that may have been swept away to sea.

In just 12 hours, Tropical Storm Washi dumped more than a month of average rains on Mindanao. The storm hit the western province of Palawan on Sunday and was expected to blow out of the country into the South China Sea later in the day.

Forecaster Leny Ruiz said records show that storms that follow the same path as Washi come only once in about every 12 years.

Palawan officials said mobilized emergency crews were on standby as the storm approached.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in a statement that the Obama administration offered its "deepest condolences" for the devastation in the southern Philippines.

"The U.S. government stands ready to assist Philippine authorities as they respond to this tragedy," the statement said. "Our thoughts and prayers are with all of those affected."

___

Associated Press writers Oliver Teves and Hrvoje Hranjski contributed to this report.

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Heavy rains kill at least 66 in Central America (AP)

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador – Central American authorities said on Sunday that at least 66 people had died in six days of heavy rains that caused landslides, floods and bridge failures throughout the region. Officials ordered evacuations as the rain was expected to continue.

El Salvador's director of civil protection, Jorge Melendez, said in a news conference that at least 24 people had died in the country, most of them buried in their houses by landslides.

The country is in a state of alert and preparing for "major disasters," Melendez said.

Authorities were evacuating people from the area around a volcano near the capital of San Salvador, where hundreds died in landslides in 1982.

Melendez said flooding had closed a major highway in the country's west and destroyed a bridge. In the eastern state of San Miguel, water overflowed from the Rio Grande river and had inundated large expanses of farmlands.

He said Sunday morning that the rain was expected to remain heavy for 24 hours and possibly continue until Wednesday. He said El Salvador had seen 7.9 inches (200 millimeters) of rain in the previous 12 hours.

Guatemalan officials confirmed 28 deaths in their country, adding that two more people were missing and that rain was expected for two more days. Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom declared a state of emergency that would be sent for approval to the congress Monday.

In Honduras, officials tallied at least nine deaths and the damaging of 2,500 homes, eight bridges and 29 roads.

"The worst is yet to come," said Rodolfo Funez, deputy director of the country's emergency commission.

Officials in Nicaragua said five people had died there with the rain abating somewhat.

___

Associated Press writers Sonia Perez in Guatemala, Freddy Cuevas in Honduras and Filadelfo Aleman in Nicaragua contributed to this story.

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At least 100 homes damaged by storms near Atlanta (Reuters)

ATLANTA (Reuters) – At least 100 homes were damaged by thundershowers and possible tornadoes that raked Atlanta's northern suburbs on Monday as the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee moved inland, but no serious injuries were reported.

Local fire officials said the turbulent weather struck Cherokee County at about 3 p.m. local time, downing power lines, snapping utility poles, uprooting trees, shattering glass and shearing roofs and siding from buildings.

The damage extended from the city of Woodstock at the south end of the county to the town of Ball Ground at its northern edge.

"It was a pretty long stretch, about 14, maybe 15 miles," said Tim Cavender, spokesman for the Cherokee County Fire Department.

He said at least 100 homes sustained damage in the area, mostly from high winds, and "there may be more."

A fire department lieutenant reached by telephone said that number was "about right."

"It's significant," added Howard Baker, a spokesman for the county sheriff's department. "We've got numerous homes and commercial businesses with varying degrees of damage."

Fallen trees crushed cars and buildings, he added, describing the overall damage as widespread but far from devastating.

"I'm not aware of any homes that were demolished," he said.

One man who sought refuge in his basement was slightly injured by debris that fell on him and was taken to an area hospital "to be checked out," Cavender said.

He and Baker said some damage appeared to have been caused by tornadoes when severe thunderstorms rolled through the area, but it would take another day to confirm any tornado activity.

The county as a whole lies roughly 20 to 40 miles north of Atlanta, the state capital.

The National Weather Service earlier on Monday issued tornado watch advisories in parts of several states, including Georgia, as Tropical Storm Lee continued to lash the Gulf Coast and the Southeast as it weakened after making landfall early on Sunday in southern Louisiana.

(Reporting by Steve Gorman; Editing by Peter Bohan)

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At least 10 die, 1,800 displaced in Nigeria floods (AP)

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria – Nigerian emergency authorities say at least 10 people have died in building collapses caused by heavy rains in the country's north.

A regional coordinator for the National Emergency Management Agency said Monday that the victims include a mother and her three-year-old child. Their house caved in during Sunday's six-hour-long rains in Kari, a town that sits along a stream in Bauchi state.

Aliyu Sambo said Kari Primary School had been converted into a camp to provide relief to about 1,800 people who had been displaced by the floods. He said about 150 mud houses and hundreds of livestock were washed away.

A fire service official also said Monday another house collapse in Kano killed six people. That brings the known death toll to 10.

Nigeria's rainy season lasts roughly from June to September.

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Flash flooding kills at least three in Pittsburgh (Reuters)

PITTSBURGH (Reuters) – Flash flooding killed at least three people in Pittsburgh on Friday when heavy rains submerged cars in flood water that was nine feet deep in places, authorities said.

The three victims, identified as a woman and two children, died after their vehicle was pinned against a tree on Washington Boulevard and they were unable to escape, Michael Huss, the city's public safety director, said in a press conference broadcast in part on local KDKA-TV.

"We have crews that are continuing to search," he said.

Huss said the water was more than nine feet deep in some areas along the road, which is near the banks of the Allegheny River. An elderly woman remains unaccounted for, he said.

Some 18 cars were stranded in the flooding and 11 people had to be rescued, according to local media reports.

Accuweather.com said rescue crews had used inflatable rafts to reach stranded drivers. Power was out to 8,400 customers.

Earlier, the National Weather Service had issued a flash flood watch for Allegheny County as storms pounded the area.

(Writing by Cynthia Johnston. Editing by Peter Bohan)

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Nigeria: At least 29 dead in rainy season floods (AP)

LAGOS, Nigeria – Nigerian emergency authorities say at least 29 people have died in weekend floods in two cities of Africa's most populous nation.

A spokesman for the National Emergency Management Agency said Tuesday that at least 20 people died in the commercial capital of Lagos during unusually heavy rains Sunday.

Yushau Shuaib said nine more people died in the city of Katsina, which saw heavy rains Friday evening.

He said the floods displaced more than 100 people in Katsina. Lagos shut down its public schools Monday.

The agency has warned that rains will be heavier this year than last year. Last year's rains displaced about 500,000 people nationwide.

The rainy season lasts from June to September. Poor drainage systems aggravate its impact.

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