Explore Iligan: Sendong hit Poblacion

Storm signal no. 2 was already raised yet the weather was just fine that day. Iligan is not usually hit by strong typhoon and a mere tropical storm is not going to do much damage as so everyone thought. Nobody suspected that it could get worse.

That night of December 16, I can still clearly remember how we (our officemates) practiced “Kampana ng Simbahan” for our upcoming Christmas Party (caroling contest) the following night. Everyone was in high spirit, giving his best hoping to bring home the bacon. It was raining outside then. Later, the girls started to worry about the weather and decided to get home. The boys stayed for a drinking session while waiting for the rain to subside. It was past 10PM when the weather got worse. The storm started to dump heavy rain and the howling winds made the boys decide to stay overnight. It took several rounds of drinks when one after another called it a night and went to bed.

It was around 2:00 AM the following day and everyone was caught by surprise when the flood water started to flow inside the house. With the help of the boys, we started evacuating some of our stuff to high ground. Unfortunately, only a few were saved. There’s raging water coming from everywhere and the water level has been rising too quickly. I was about to go back into the house to get and save more things when I saw the water has risen to a shoulder-level high. I was dumbfounded at the sight of our belongings, some floating while others were a meter underwater.

I lived in Poblacion for more than a decade already and as far as I can remember, no similar flash flood ever hit our area. The large amount of rainfall caused the creek near our place to swell, dumping water into the streets of Barangay Poblacion. I was fine until these questions crept into my mind - How about those barangays along the river banks of Mandulog and Tubod River? What had happened to them?… the thought shook me at my core, uncontrollably. I was frightened.

Zamora corner Mariano Badelles Sr. Sts.