TWELVE passengers died yesterday after
their vessel capsized off San Francisco town in Quezon because
of bad weather.
At least 129 passengers of MV Blue Water
Princess had been rescued as of noon yesterday, said Lt. Col.
Rhoderick Parayno, spokesman of the Southern Luzon Command (Solcom).
The "ro-ro" (roll-on, roll-off) vessel
capsized at around 6 a.m., an hour after it left the port of
Dalahican in Lucena City in Quezon. It was carrying 256
passengers and 14 vehicles and was on its way to Masbate, he
said.
Parayno said eight bodies were retrieved in
Pagsangahan village in San Francisco town while the rest were
recovered at the nearby town of San Andres.
Parayno said of the eight fatalities
recovered in San Francisco, two were men and six were women,
including Welgin Perlas of Mompong, Marinduque, and Lourdes
Ricablanca, of Lucena City.
Two of those recovered in San Andres town
were identified as Rodolfo dela Fuente and Nicolas Arcipe.
The Office of the Civil Defense at the
Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Quezon) said it recorded
eight dead and 18 missing.
Director Vicente Tomasar said the casualty
toll might rise as rescue workers were still accounting for
the other passengers.
Parayno said Solcom, the Navy, Coast Guard,
and the Quezon provincial coordinating council are jointly
conducting search and rescue operations.
Solcom sent two helicopters to the area but
the aircraft had to go back due to bad weather.
Patrol Ship 28 was sent from Batangas but
had to seek refuge in Marinduque due to strong currents.
A weather disturbance is affecting the
country. Typhoon "Bebeng," as of 2 p.m. yesterday, was located
650 km east northeast of Basco, Batanes. It had maximum
sustained winds of 160 kph near the center and gustiness of up
to 195 kph. It is forecast to move north northwest at 22 kph.
In Negros Occidental, heavy rains since
Wednesday triggered a landslide that rendered the highway in
Sipalay City impassable for almost seven hours.
The rains also caused flooding in eight
Sipalay barangays, affecting 1,543 families, destroying four
houses and damaging 24 others in Sipalay.
The landslide hit barangay Mambaroto, Sipalay City, about
two kilometers from the city proper, but no one was hurt, said
Sipalay Mayor Soledad Montilla. – With Benjamin Balce
