Chaba tears through Marianas

By JOHN RAVELO, AGNES E. DONATO and CASSIE DLG FEJERAN
REPORTERS

Packing winds of almost supertyphoon-strength, Typhoon Chaba roared through the Northern Marianas early last night, causing power outages, stranding scores of travelers, and forcing at least 400 residents to temporarily take refuge at evacuation centers.

As of 6pm last night, Chaba wielded 120mph winds, with gusts of up to 150mph, as its eye approached about 50 miles south-southeast of Saipan. A typhoon becomes a supertyphoon once wind strength reaches at least 150 mph.

At this time, the Emergency Management Office said the typhoon’s eye was about 50 miles south-southeast of Tinian, 55 miles east-northeast of Rota, 230 miles south of Alamagan, 255 south of Pagan, and 305 miles south of Agrihan.

The typhoon was moving westerly at 14mph. Based on weather forecasts, the typhoon would continue to move in this direction within the next 12 hours at a maintained pace.

Chaba’s strong winds caused tree branches to fall on roads and destroy some properties. By nighttime, strong winds on land were expected to reach 90-100 mph, with gusts of up to 125 mph, the EMO said.

“So far, everything is under control. I’ve talked with the mayors of Rota, Tinian, and Saipan and they’re all prepared. People are in shelters,” Gov. Juan N. Babauta said.

The EMO said, that, as of press time, it received no reports of any casualties or damaged homes and properties. The EMO disclosed that over 373 residents trooped to temporary shelters on Saipan, Tinian, and Rota. It does not include evacuees housed at the Kagman Elementary School and the Chacha Junior High School.

The high number filled five of the nine designated shelters on Saipan, prompting the government to open up the two other schools as evacuation centers.

“Our main concern right now is to get people indoors,” said Jenn Castro, communications manager at the Governor’s Public Information Office.

On Saipan, the evacuees totaled more than 335 people. Filled to capacity were the Koblerville Elementary School, which had 78 evacuees; Kagman High School, 55; Garapan Elementary School, 40; San Vicente Elementary School, 36; and Dandan Elementary School, 27.

Oleai Elementary School already had 43 evacuees as of 6pm; Marianas High School, 38; William S. Reyes Elementary School, 10; and Tanapag Elementary School, 8.

Twelve Tinian residents sought refuge at the Tinian Elementary School, while some 26 Rota residents vacated their homes to stay at the island’s Man’ Amko Center.

By 6pm, bus services ferrying evacuees to designated shelters had to be stopped due to severe typhoon conditions.

Meanwhile, the Commonwealth Health Center on Saipan made the facility available to shelter women who are at least eight months pregnant.

Panic buying

Residents and motorists lined up in stores and gas stations in last minute preparation for the onslaught of Chaba.

As early as 3pm, many gas stations were already closing down their facilities in anticipation of Chaba’s wrath by nighttime.

Thirty-eight-year-old Efren Reyes, a maintenance worker who was with 10 other peers from his religious group, drove a van to the Shell gas station in Dandan around 3:30pm, only to find out that it had already closed down for the day. His group got stranded at the gas station for more than one hour, since he could no longer drive the vehicle as it had almost ran out of gasoline.

The Shell gas station on Airport Road, however, remained open. “We’re not closing down,” said gas attendant Edward Sablan.

Sablan said the station received several telephone calls from residents from different villages asking them not to close down.

At the San Jose Mart grocery store, consumers could be seen in long lines at the counters, buying food and other supplies.

Milan, 29, bought candles and canned goods from the Dolphin Wholesale Store, anticipating power outages.

“When typhoon Tingting hit us, we had no power for several days at home,” she said.
Chaba also caused power outages, as well as the cancellation of inbound and outbound flights of international air carriers.

All flights cancelled until further notice

At least 500 passengers are stranded on Saipan after all airlines cancelled their flights until further notice, due to the strong winds and heavy rains brought by Typhoon Chaba.

Commonwealth Ports Authority executive director Carlos Salas said all flights departing from and arriving at the Saipan International Airport were cancelled due to zero visibility starting 9:30am Sunday.

The last flight to leave the airport was Northwest Airlines’ 9am service, which was bound for Nagoya.

“There may be some 500 to 600 stranded passengers who were supposed to leave this afternoon. The airlines are taking care of them,” he added.

The passengers who were not able to leave on Sunday afternoon were mostly bound for Guam and Tokyo. Several flights from Tokyo, Osaka, Seoul, and Guam were also scheduled to arrive on Saipan starting yesterday afternoon until Monday dawn.

Japan Airlines sales manager Kunio Tomita disclosed that some of the cancelled inbound and outbound flights have been already rescheduled.

JAL’s flight 947 from Narita, which was supposed to arrive about 2:20pm yesterday, would arrive at 1:20pm today, Tomita said. Flight 948, which was supposed to depart Saipan for Narita about 3:30pm yesterday, would instead fly about 2:50pm today.

Salas said essential airport employees would remain on standby status at the airport until such time that management decides to resume operation at the airport.

“We want to make sure that the runways, taxiways, roadways, check-in lobby, gates, and the rest of the airport are ready to operate as soon as the weather subsides,” Salas said. “Hopefully, we can figure out what we can do by 12 midnight. We will reschedule flights as soon as the weather permits.”

Salas also reported that the Saipan seaport was closed since Saturday afternoon.

“Seaports are always one condition ahead. So when [Gov. Juan N. Babauta declared the Northern Marianas] under typhoon condition of readiness 3 yesterday morning, the seaport was already under condition 2,” the CPA official said.

He added that all concerned vessel owners or operators were instructed to activate their typhoon emergency plans. Vessels that needed to leave were also told to expedite their departure to prevent them from incurring any typhoon-related damage.

Power outages hit islands

Despite preparations made by the Commonwealth Utilities Corp., power outages were experienced all over the islands on the first day of Typhoon Chaba’s onslaught.

“Everybody got hit,” Pamela Mathis, CUC special adviser for corporate communications, said in an interview. She reported that various areas had power outages at some point yesterday, with the outage period ranging between five minutes to hours.

Mathis, however, added that none of the outages were caused by CUC power plant or engine problems. “All the power plants are up, the engines are ready. The heavy winds and things that are getting blown into the lines are the problem,” she said.

As of 6pm, areas from Sadog Tasi up to Capitol Hill and down to all of Kagman had no power supply, after CUC’s feeder 4 went down at least five times. Portions of the Tanapag to Marpi area were also in the dark.

Feeders 1, 2, and 3 also bogged down, causing power outage in villages such as Lower Base, Puerto Rico, the Commonwealth Health Center, Garapan, Chalan Laulau, and Chalan Kiya.

“We are a little concerned about Kagman and Koblerville, because 136 of our water wells are located in that area,” Mathis added.

She also said that it is CUC’s normal practice to stop working on a feeder if it has bogged down at least three times. But she reported that this “three-strikes-out” rule were not applied yesterday.

“We will keep working until our men cannot see each other,” she quoted CUC power division Diego Babauta as saying.

According to Mathis, CUC crews made preparations for the arrival of the typhoon as early as Friday by getting their equipment ready.

She added that two teams are working on 12-hour shifts to keep power going all over Saipan.

There was no immediate information on the power status of the other islands.

Residents evacuate to schools

Shortly after the typhoon condition II was declared in the islands, CNMI residents began evacuating to the nearest designated shelter stations.

According to Joe Etpison, a teacher at the Kobler Elementary School, the first group of people arrived late Saturday night.

“We had phone calls for information about the shelter around 8 pm [on Saturday], but we did not have anyone come in until around 10pm.The last group came in around 11 this morning,” he said.

Some 78 adults and children were staying at the six rooms made available in the Koblerville school. “There are 10 families here with us. We only have six rooms so some families are staying together in one room,” said Etpison.

“There probably won’t be any classes tomorrow [today]. We just have to wait until the people from the Emergency Management Office gives us the word on the weather,” he added.

Other residents seeking shelter at KES were referred to William S. Reyes Elementary School and Marianas High School.

As of 2pm yesterday, Marianas High School was hosting seven families from Koblerville, Susupe, As Lito, and Chalan Lao Lao.

“I checked in with Koblerville elementary school, but they told us it was close so we came here,” said a resident from As Lito.

Robert and Maria Sumoumou, residents in Susupe, felt it was safe to bring their two children to the shelter. “We live [behind MHS]. Also my other son and his wife will be coming. We plan on being here as long as they have it open,” said Robert Sumoumou.

Despite the strong winds, Frances Deleon Guerrero said her sister drove from Kagman to Koblerville to take them to the nearest shelter available. Deleon Guerrero is joined by her mother, sister, and their four children in the shelter. (with Liberty Dones)