It was around this time last year that a Baltimore-based relief agency provided emergency assistance to the Philippines after a catastrophic typhoon killed thousands and ravaged large swaths of landscape.
On Sunday morning, two additional members of Lutheran World Relief were scheduled join those still working in the Southeast Asian country, this time as a new typhoon made landfall on Saturday evening and is expected to unleash another fury.
In fact, Lutheran World Relief officials said that the Typhoon Hagupit will likely impact the same regions in the central portion of the country as those hit last year by Typhoon Haiyan, which made landfall on Nov. 8 of last year. According to USAID, last year's typhoon — one of the strongest ever to make landfall — killed 6,300 people in the Philippines alone while destroying 1.1 million homes and leaving 4 million people displaced.
Lutheran World Relief officials said that the storm comes as people are still struggling to recover from the damage caused by last year's typhoon. The agency said in wake of this year's typhoon it has made an initial commitment of $50,000 to assist those most affected and will assess conditions for long-term relief. The relief agency works in 35 nations providing disaster assistance, humanitarian relief and agricultural development.
Tim McCully, the agency's vice president for international programs, said that over the past year about 25 members of the agency have taken part in relief efforts in the Philippines. He said that those members are already in areas slated to be affected by the storm. He added that flights into such locales as Tacloban City, where some of the worst devastation from last year's typhoon occurred, have already been suspended.
"The fact that this storm is coming in at almost identically the same path [as last year's storm] is doubly concerning for us," said McCully. He said that whenever the storm clears the agency will implement a cash-for-work program where populations will receive payment to clean irrigation systems and damaged areas.
"That will provide them with a little income to kick start the local economy," McCully said. He added that the agency will also work with local agencies to provide shelter repair kits for families whose houses have been damaged or destroyed.
"What we're anticipating is for damage to directly impact the infrastructure of the country —shelter, telecommunications and electricity, we all expect to be badly damaged," McCully said. "It's also is going to have a significant impact on the economy, with real danger of crops being destroyed."
The two additional Lutheran World Relief members are slated to fly into Manila (about 530 miles from Tacloban City) and then head to the typhoon affected areas. McCully said that the agency will likely add send additional personnel once the affects of the typhoon are assessed.
Among the two bound for the Philippines now are Liz O'Neill, an agency program associate for Asia and the Middle East. On Saturday, the Ellicott City resident said she spent a portion of the day at an outdoor recreation gear store looking for sleeping bags, in case flights into the country are grounded and she must sleep overnight in airports en route.
O'Neill was slated to leave BWI Marshall Airport on Sunday morning en route to Detroit then Japan and then Manila, where she will take another plane to the area where the typhoon has hit. She said she was slated to arrive at midnight Monday Philippine Standard Time and is expected to stay until around the week of Christmas.
"The latest information that I have from our country's staff in the Philippines as of [Saturday] morning is that the typhoon is expected to make landfall six times in two days," said O'Neill. "When I arrive, I'm expecting a pretty organized, focused team effort because [agency staff] have been working on this for the past four days.
"I'm a bit anxious, but when I get anxious I think about how it must feel in the Philippines," said O'Neill. "People there are naturally worried about what's going to happen, but they're also more prepared than they were in year's past because they've gotten so used to expecting storms at least once a year of pretty high magnitude."
McCully said that the agency over the last six months had shifted from its emergency response efforts to programs to help the Philippines' agricultural and fishing economy bounce back. He said those programs will continue for another two years.
"Obviously, the impact of this storm is going to require us to double down and provide additional humanitarian assistance in the coming weeks," McCully said, "and then add affected population to the program we already have up and running."