Authorities in the Philippines have evacuated thousands of people from 2,500 villages in the north of the country ahead of today's arrival of the fourth storm to hit the archipelago in less than a month.
The Interior Secretary on Sunday ordered the forced evacuation of residents from 2,500 Luzon villages, warning that the agricultural region's mountains, valleys and plains were more susceptible to flash floods and landslides.
With Typhoon Toraji approaching quickly, there was little time to transport large numbers of people to safety, Jonvic Remulla said.
"We understand that some want to stay, but we have to get them out," Remulla told reporters.
Toraji hit northeastern Aurora province this morning with sustained winds of up to 130 kilometers per hour and gusts of up to 180 kilometers per hour.
Forecasters predict the typhoon will track northwest through the Luzon region, weakening as it crosses a mountain range and then continues into the South China Sea.
Hong Kong has already announced that it will raise tropical storm signal 1 (the lowest alert out of five) today or on Tuesday, as soon as Toraji is less than 800 kilometers from the Chinese semi-autonomous region.
The neighboring region of Macau also mentioned the possibility of issuing a tropical storm warning.
Schools were closed, inter-island ferry services and domestic flights were suspended in Philippine provinces in the path of the typhoon, the 14th tropical storm to hit the archipelago this year.
Forecasters said they were tracking another storm in the Pacific Ocean that could affect the country.
In the space of less than a month, two typhoons and a tropical storm caused more than 160 deaths, damaged thousands of homes and farmland, and affected more than nine million people in the Philippines.
In some cities and towns in the country, the equivalent of two months of normal precipitation rained in 24 hours.
The Philippines has received help from Southeast Asian countries, particularly Singapore, and the United States, a longtime ally, to transport food, water and other aid to the hardest-hit northern provinces.
The Philippine archipelago is frequently hit by typhoons and earthquakes and has more than a dozen active volcanoes, making it one of the most natural disaster-prone countries in the world.
In 2013, Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest on record, left more than 7,300 people dead or missing, leveled entire villages and caused ships to run aground and collide with homes in the central Philippines.
