Typhoon Matmo strikes northern Philippines amid earthquake recovery, forcing evacuations

Typhoon disrupts Philippines disaster response

A typhoon hit northern Philippines on Friday, adding to the challenges of responding to a deadly earthquake in a central province and two recent storms.

Typhoon Matmo made landfall in Dinapigue town, Isabela province, from the Pacific with sustained winds reaching 130 kph (81 mph), and was forecast to move northwest across agricultural valleys and mountainous provinces, prompting evacuations in flood- and landslide-prone villages.

“Schools suspended classes, and cargo and fishing vessels were prohibited from entering the rough seas along the path of the typhoon,” Philippine forecasters said. The storm is expected to reach the South China Sea on Saturday, heading toward southern China.

Hong Kong’s observatory said Matmo would pass by the territory on an expected path toward Hainan Island and the mainland’s Guangdong province over the weekend.

Matmo, locally known as Paolo, was the 16th tropical cyclone to hit the Philippines this year. The Southeast Asian archipelago nation is lashed by about 20 typhoons and storms a year and lies on the seismically active Pacific “Ring of Fire,” making it one of the countries most prone to natural disasters.

The typhoon was not expected to directly affect the region further south where a 6.9-magnitude earthquake Tuesday night killed at least 72 people and injured more than 550 others, mostly in the Cebu province city of Bogo and outlying towns.

More than 5,000 houses were damaged, and some residents were staying in parks, grassy clearings and on sidewalks despite sporadic rain because aftershocks left them too fearful to return to their homes.

Another storm, Bualoi, caused at least 37 deaths and displaced thousands in the Philippines last week before hitting Vietnam, where 49 people died and economic damages were estimated at $485 million.

And Super Typhoon Ragasa, which at its peak was the world's strongest tropical cyclone of the year, caused several deaths in the Philippines as it passed by the country before landfall in southern China.