Five rescue workers have died in the aftermath of Typhoon Noru, which made landfall in the Philippines Sunday and is expected to gather strength before hitting Vietnam on Tuesday.
The Typhoon Karding, known locally as the Typhoon Karding, intensified rapidly from Saturday to Sunday, arriving as a super typhoon with maximum sustained winds of 240 kilometers per hour about 150 miles per hour It blasted the main island of Luzon on Sunday, before weakened to maximum winds of 167 kilometers per hour 104 miles per hour, according to the US Joint Typhoon Warning Center, equivalent to a Category 2 typhoon.
The bodies of five rescue workers who were killed in the country's northern Bulacan province have been recovered by the government, according to Richard Gordon, chairman of the Philippines Red Cross.
He said that landslides are expected in more rural and mountainous regions, adding to the fear of more casualties.
Photos from Luzon show residents wading through chest-level floodwater to carry their belongings from their submerged homes.
There were rows of tents set up in schools and gymnasiums that were being used as evacuation centers, where 13,600 families retreated to avoid the flooding, Gordon said. Images and video from the island show destroyed houses and debris littering the road.
The Red Cross has mobilized 2,000 volunteers in the affected areas to provide food and other relief supplies.
On Monday, schools and businesses were closed in Luzon, and President Ferdinand Marcos ordered supplies to be airlifted and clean-up equipment provided to most affected communities.
At the point at which we can stand down is when the majority of evacuees are already back home, according to Marcos, who spoke to disaster management officials on Monday.
Noru is about to move away from Luzon Island and is expected to increase before it makes landfall over Vietnam on Tuesday.
Luzon, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy and about half of the country's 110 million population, started clean-up operations after floods in the capital region started subsiding, officials said.
Marcos, who will conduct an aerial inspection later on Monday, ordered officials to provide emergency power supply to two provinces north of the capital, Aurora and Nueva Ecija, which were left without electricity.
Internet connectivity monitoring service Netblocks said several regions were affected by internet outages relating to power cuts after super typhoon Noru made landfall.