Anatomy of the Metro Manila flood: Part I- It is Expected to Happen

It came to me as a no surprise that we have deadly floods in Metro Manila. The reasons are not because we have denuded our forest (well partly yes,), nor because of climate change, nor because the storm (mind you, only a category 2) that carried lots of rainfall. It is because of two main reasons:

First, we have cemented, asphalted and built over large tracks of land that rainwater could no longer be absorbed by the land. This is the natural process and in so doing replenish our ground water. So what happens when we covered and built over raw land, we simply diverted rainwater into small canals, sewage system(is there one?), reclaimed our small creeks (just compare today's map with those in 1950's), silted our major tributaries and built on or covered our catchment areas.

This last one is one of the two main reasons why we have disaster. People complained of high water along Pateros, areas around laguna lake, areas along marikina river. But you know what, these places like Provident subdivision and others are situated in FLOOD PLAINS. These are natural catchment areas. Nature has created it so that excess water will have someplace to go before they are drained out. The area and extend of these FLOOD PLAINS have been designed by nature over tens of thousand of years. It also tells us that nature has provided these catchment areas as there will be times when more rains will come that rivers and tributaries could not handle.

But our planners, architects, engineers and politician cum businessmen thought they know more. Who let and why were housing units were allowed to be built on these flood plains bespeak of extreme ignorance on laws of nature. How many times have we heard businessmen convince our planners that they will make a wasteland profitable?

Reason #2: We, as a family or individuals are not prepared. I grew up in Quezon province where i experienced typhoon almost every year. I learned in my early years the preparations we do everytime a typhoon is expected to hit us. At least two days before typhoon arrives, we make sure we have kerosene (or used oil)and matches for our light (we have no electricity then), we have enough batteries for our radio (to keep track of typhoon) and for our flashlight, we buy sufficient rice, salt and animal lard and dry firewood to last for a week, stock up water in two clay jars. To protect our house, we put support structures both at the lee and alee side, put used fish net and lots of weight on our roofs so it will not be blown away. To protect our crops, we trim excess leaves of the bananas and put extra support for the fruit bearing ones, trim excess branches of fruit trees. All our animals (pigs, chickens, ducks) are beneath our houses and extra fodder is collected. In short, imagine the amount of work just to prepare for the worst.

During the passage of the typhoon itself, it was fun for us kids to put those tin cans, pails and basins where our roof drips. This we need to keep our sleeping quarters dry. it is also a nice time with all family members present, a time for story telling, a time for prayers. Compare this with a typical Metro Manila family. Because it is a weekend and raining, most people are glued to their television set, or glued to the computer and children playing computer games. Unmindful of the threat of the storm, they go on with their normal weekend life. Only when the power was cut off did they realize that flood was fast rising. Not knowing what to do, the rest is history.