Responding to Typhoon Ulysses
Above is a video recorded on November 15, me and my family surveyed the streets of Nangka, a barangay in Marikina City, which was one of the areas most severely affected by Typhoon Ulysses.
My family also lives in Marikina, but thankfully our area was high enough to not be affected by the rising flood of the Marikina river and its creeks. However, we were able to witness first-hand the destruction that typhoons cause to our families and friends in our area. What is more baffling than the magnitude of the destruction, was the frequency of the typhoons and the government’s negligence to propose solutions despite how often Marikina is affected by these every year. Living in Marikina, I am no stranger to flooded streets and brownouts every year, but it is only now where I start to realize how preventable these destructions are. The government should have plenty of experience with dealing with typhoons by now, but this is clearly not seen by the effects seen in my city. So much damage and destruction could have been prevented, and it is this thought that had bothered me ever since our trip to Nangka.
My father, being a leader in the construction industry, often uses his company’s resources in order to help with the barangay’s response and relief efforts during these times of crises. And in his experience, he has observed the effects of typhoons to Marikina every year and often talks to me about solutions to answer the destruction caused by these natural disasters.
It was through his examples was where I was able to begin assessing and formulating possible solutions to prevent or reduce the destruction that typhoons cause to Marikina and its citizens. As a person rooted in logic, I found it equally important to investigate the causes of the destruction to aid in the solution-making process. I found it helpful to first organize my thoughts through Da Vinci’s principleof Connesione, illustrated in my sketched mind map below.
I chose exercise for Connesione because I believe that in problem solving, one must first jot all their ideas and concepts, and it is through the process of organizing theses ideas when solutions may arise.
When thinking about the aftermath of Typhoon Ulysses, I cannot erase the image of Nangka, how the streets were covered in muddied belongings, the buckets of dirty water that people were dumping out of their houses, the missing roofs of some houses. I can’t help but ask myself: “What makes a typhoon so destructive?” I pinpoint two elements: strong winds and flooding. While there are man-made forces that contribute to the destruction brought by the typhoon, it is these two elements that serve as the most damaging aspects of Ulysses. While the rainfall of the current typhoon had not reached the same average of that of Ondoy, Ulysses came on the backs of three previous storms in a much shorter period. The abruptness of the typhoon is what had contributed to the destruction caused, as water levels risen so fast to allow time for people to evacuate and rearrange their belongings so that it wouldn’t get submerged. But there is so much that people can do to mitigate the effects of the typhoon, which is why I turn to the government for the solutions.
There are so much solutions that the government could have been done to minimize the catastrophe, and have categorized these solutions in to two: response and preventative measures.
There are several aspects of the government’s response that could be improved, such as the efficacy of their rescue efforts, and the availability and quality of equipment that they use for these efforts. I concluded this after my family’s visit to Nangka, seeing as their electric powered backhoes were rendered useless after they had been submerged during the typhoon. The local government units should have already prepared emergency supplies such as food, water, and medicine, so that it would be immediately available to the victims of the typhoon.
What is even more important than responding in times of crises is to be able to mitigate the potential damage before the crises even happens. I have further subdivided this category into two: people and riverside. The safety of its people should be the government’s number one concern. The Marikina government should already have a record of the areas that are frequently flooded, and should have evacuated the residents of these areas beforehand. For a more permanent solution, the government should look into relocation efforts for these people in these areas in order to prevent further destruction and loss of life in future typhoons. To accomplish this, significant urban planning must be done so that no resident is misplaced or left homeless. To solve the problem of flooding itself, one must look into the source of the flooding: the Marikina river. Dredging involves the removal of the soil and sediments at the bottom of a river in order to increase its depth, so that when a typhoon arrives and increases the water level, the river would not overflow into the residential areas. The soil and sediments taken can then be used for projects that require such materials. River walls have been installed along the creeks of Marikina in the past, however, not in a magnitude that would produce significant results. A large scale walling of the Marikina river would hinder the flow of the river to the coast, which combined with dredging, will significantly reduce the chances of the Marikina river overflowing and flooding the surrounding areas.
All of these proposals would mean nothing if the government stays as negligent as it is now. Which why I turn to the bigger causes of why the typhoon was as catastrophic as it was: global warming and the negligence of the government. Admittedly, these are problems that are far too complex for me to propose long term solutions for as either these fields are subject to other factors that I do not understand. However, it is critical to acknowledge that the problem comes from these two issues, and that we should be able to direct our actions to understanding and solving these if we want to witness true improvements in disaster preparedness in the Philippines.
