By Dino Balabo
MALOLOS CITY—Answered
prayers!
This was how some
Bulakenyos described the low rainfall yesterday morning, a day after priests of
the Diocese of Malolos started praying while other residents invoked an
“oration imperata” on Tuesday as intense rains pummelled several towns in the
province.
Lower rainfall also gave a
sigh of relief to thousands of Bulakenyos who expected deeper floods yesterday
as the Bustos Dam discharged 500 cubic meters per second of water into the
Angat River starting at 4 p.m. on Tuesday.
Elmer Santos, a municipal
councilor from Hagonoy, was overjoyed with the turn of events.
“God heard our prayers,”
he said a day after sending out text messages containing oratio imperata and
asked his town mates to recite it.
Records from the Bulacan
Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office (PDRMMO) showed a lull in
rainfall in the towns of Bulakan, Hagonoy, Sta, Maria, Paombong, Pandi, San
Rafael, and Norzagaray.
The most notable changes
were observed in Paombong which recorded 127 mm six hour rainfall on Tuesday
morning, but yesterday, it dropped to 48.77 mm.
In Bulakan, Tuesday’s
rainfall was 80.01 mm but dropped to 11.86 mm yesterday while in Meycauayan
City, it dropped to 38.10 mm yesterday from
63.75 mm on Tuesday.
Santos said that both
towns were spared from the deep flooding
they expected to set in by early morning yesterday as Bustos Dam
operators reduced the discharge to 190 cms by 11:30 p.m. of Tuesday.
The same was echoed by
Mayor Raulito Manlapaz who explained in an exclusive interview yesterday that flooding
in Hagonoy town was only caused by sea level rise or high tide and partly
aggravated by the tail end of the water discharged from Bustos Dam.
Manlapaz also said that
since Monday, at least 22 of the 26 villages of Hagonoy town went underwater
due to heavy rains and high tide.
They are now repacking
relief goods to be distributed before the end of the week even if there is no
declaration of state of calamity in the town.
For his part, Vice Mayor
Pedro Santos said that they will prioritize over 100 families evacuated in
different evacuation centers in the town and the coastal villages of Pugad and
Tibaguin as fisherfolk in those villages were not able to go out to the seas
for over a week now due to stormy weather since typhoon Labuyo passed Luzon last
week.
As this developed, the PDRRMO reported a total of 2,436 families
composed of 9,283 individuals were evacuated from 14 towns of the province,
namely, Balagtas, Baliwag, Bocaue, Calumpit, Guiguinto, Marilao,Obando, Pulilan,
Paombong, Plaridel, Sta. Maria, and the cities of San Jose Del Monte, Meycauayan , and Malolos.
The PDRRMO also said that
heavy rains rendered a number of roads in the province non-passable to light
vehicles as of yesterday Thursday morning.
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