Rescue teams, using shovels and bare hands, searched on Sunday for more bodies under tonnes of mud and debris in the northern Philippines as officials counted the cost on crops and property from two typhoons this month.
Rescue workers pulled out more bodies from a small mountain village buried under mud in Northern Luzon on Saturday, as the death toll from landslides and floods triggered by heavy rains rose to 193, disaster officials said.
As of 6 a.m. on Sunday, 489,840 families or around 2.2 million people have been affected by tropical storm “Pepeng” (international code name Parma), according to the National Disaster Coordinating Council (NDCC) situation report.

A total 23,331 families or around 100,000 individuals remain in 281 designated evacuation centers. Meantime, 101 people were injured while 46 are missing.

The death toll from landslides in Benguet rose to 134 while 34 remained missing.

The NDCC estimated total damage at P5.08 billion, including P3.99 billion to agriculture and private property and P1.09 billion to infrastructure.

Houses that were totally damaged were pegged at 2,748 while homes that were partially damaged amounted to 20,607.

Emergency teams, including troops, began clearing major roads in at least 16 northern provinces in Luzon as the skies cleared and floods began to recede, allowing relief workers to gain access to muddied villages and submerged towns.