Permanent evac centers being pushed
LEGAZPI CITY – President Duterte has ordered the drafting of an evacuation center prototype where people can shelter during disasters and calamities.
Presidential Adviser on Political Affairs Francis Tolentino said the President has instructed the National Housing Authority (NHA) to come up with a model of the permanent evacuation center during a Cabinet meeting on Monday.
Duterte recently visited Albay to check on the condition of evacuees displaced by the eruption Mayon volcano.
“We always have typhoons and in some cases earthquakes and in the case of Albay, volcanic eruptions. So evacuation of affected residents is really inevitable,” Tolentino told Manila Bulletin in an interview here.
Public schools are usually converted into evacuation centers during calamities.
In the ongoing eruption of Mayon, almost all of the 76 evacuation centers sheltering more than 75,000 people are public elementary and high school buildings or classrooms.
As a result, classes are affected or suspended until the evacuees are sent home.
Aside from class suspensions, school officials have to deal with the problems of damaged property, unusable comfort rooms and the surge in water and electricity consumption.
“That is why the President wanted to have this permanent evacuation centers to provide decent shelter to evacuees and in order not to disturb the classes,” said Tolentino.
Tolentino said the NHA would be using its own funds for the project.
Mayon has not shown signs of subsiding, with the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) recording 152 lava fountains in two days, 78 of them occurring successively since Monday.
The volcano continues to spew lava and gas with some episodes lasting three to 41 minutes and accompanied by rumbling sounds heard up to 10 kilometers away.
Steam-laden columns continued to rise up to 2.5 kilometers from the summit before drifting east and northeast.
Throughout Tuesday night, lava flows and consequent incandescent rockfalls were observed in the mountain’s Miisi and Bonga-Buyuan channels.
Pyroclastic flow, a fast-moving current of hot gas and volcanic matter continued to be deposited in the Miisi, Bonga, and Basud gullies.
From 8 a.m. Tuesday to 8 a.m. Wednesday, a total of 83 volcanic earthquakes, most of which corresponded to lava fountains, were recorded by Mayon’s seismic monitoring network.
Sulfur dioxide emission slightly increased at an average of 1,885 tons per day since Tuesday.
Phivolcs said Mayon’s edifice has been swelling since October and November, pushed up by magma welling up from the volcano’s depths.
The volcano remains on alert level 4 because a hazardous eruption is still eminent.
The six-kilometer permanent danger zone around Mayon has largely been ignored, particularly by quarry companies who continue to send workers to the restricted area.
“It seems that these companies are more concerned with profits than the welfare of their workers who endure the punishing conditions at the mining sites amid the volcanic eruption,” Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Roy Cimatu said.
Cimatu was reacting to reports that quarry workers were still hauling sand and gravel inside the danger zone despite warnings from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and Phivolcs.
He said an erupting volcano could blast ash, lava, solid rocks and gases into the air, creating hazards that could hurt or even kill people and destroy property.
“Our primordial concern must be the safety and health of all people affected by the eruption of Mayon Volcano,” Cimatu said.
He earlier warned against the negative impacts of volcanic gases, particularly sulfur dioxide, on the environment and human health.
He said that when sulfur dioxide combines with water and air, it forms sulfuric acid, which is the main component of acid rain.
Acid rain can cause deforestation, acidify waterways and kill aquatic life, and corrode building materials and paints, he said.
It could affect the respiratory system, particularly the lungs, and irritate the eyes, he added.