Lately, that is what 60-year-old Rebecca Cañete’s “regular” seems like: she checks for cracks of their home after one more tremor within the early hours of the day earlier than she packs sufficient provides that they’ll convey to a makeshift tent made out of tarpaulins the place they may sleep for the evening.
When a van or truck passes by, the world stops.
Cañete and her neighbors, residents of Daanbantayan city, make a mad sprint to whoever is handing out packs of rice, or canned items, or bottles of water, or diapers.
“If a van stops by, we run quick. If one other stops at a distinct space, we run to them as properly,” Cañete advised Rappler on Tuesday, October 14.
Within the first week after a magnitude 6.9 earthquake hit the province on September 30, she shared, they waited three days earlier than water and electrical energy returned to their residence. Water and energy proceed to be spotty, owing to the aftershocks that adopted and nonetheless persist.
Two weeks on, some residents have discovered the braveness to lastly return to their houses after staying in tent cities — that’s, till a magnitude 5.8 aftershock hit northern Cebu at round 1 am on October 13.
So, for some, it was again to the outdated regular: life in tents exterior their houses and trauma that returns with each tremor they really feel and crunch they hear in the course of the dreaded aftershocks. Hope, in some components of northern Cebu, comes within the type of automobiles stuffed to the brim with reduction items.
Cañete and her neighbors want extra personal donors move by their village — as a rule, they inform Rappler, they carry extra reduction items than the packs from authorities.
Quick response
As of October 9, the nationwide authorities says a minimum of 74 individuals have died from the earthquake, together with a clan of 11 in Bogo whose homes have been crushed by a landslide that the quake triggered. Over 559 have been reported injured from the earthquake.
For essentially the most half, rescue and retrieval operations concluded early, with all lacking individuals accounted for by the afternoon of October 2, or simply beneath 48 hours after the earthquake.
The numbers proceed to return in — over 71,996 homes and 706 infrastructures broken by the tremor and a minimum of 201,245 households or 722,919 people affected by the quake.
It’s the final statistic that was significantly troublesome to neglect within the days instantly after the quake — days after roads and bridges that didn’t maintain vital harm have been cleared and declared satisfactory, and reduction operations activated in northern Cebu.
Throughout the totally different cities and cities, and all the best way as much as island communities reachable solely by boat, earthquake survivors would maintain up indicators, ready alongside highways and main roads, to beg for meals and water.
Those that didn’t have indicators nonetheless waited alongside household and neighbors — simply in case a personal reduction drive would move by and hand out assist.
Lengthy earlier than formal tent cities — together with these with non permanent shelters from the Philippine Pink Cross — have been created, neighbors and communities settled into expanses of open land to construct makeshift shelters, both utilizing ready-to-assemble tents or improvising with sticks and tarpaulin (trapal to most Filipinos).
One such tent metropolis popped up in Daanbantayan, on the foot of a limestone cliff. Think about how that alarmed the Division of Social Welfare and Growth (DSWD) since their supposed protected house was a hazard in itself. Native social staff have been dispatched to convey assist and attempt to persuade individuals to return to their houses, or a minimum of vacate the hazard space.
In the meantime, alongside the freeway, visitors was at a standstill — DSWD vans carrying the nationwide authorities’s first wave of reduction packs trudged alongside beside privately-owned pickup vans, privately-commissioned vans, SUVs, vans, and the occasional sedan. All have been keen to go up north to convey much-needed assist.
But on the bottom, assist was nonetheless in need up till the primary weekend after the quake. What made the final mile — or the ultimate supply of reduction packs — so arduous to succeed in?
Coastal, agricultural Cebu
A majority of the areas closely affected by the earthquake belong to the 4th and fifth congressional districts of Cebu. These embrace the town of Bogo and the municipalities of Borbon, Catmon, Daanbantayan, Bantayan, Madridejos, Medellin, Santa Fe, San Remigio, Sogod, Tabogon, and Tabuelan.
These areas, particularly Bogo the place the earthquake’s epicenter is, are greater than 100 kilometers away by way of the Central Nautical Freeway from the Cebu Provincial Capitol in Cebu Metropolis.
It takes round 4 hours for vans and heavy automobiles to journey from the capitol’s reduction items packing warehouse to the Bogo Metropolis Corridor operations heart.
Rappler visited northern Cebu on October 1, 8, and 14, and famous that many residents within the final mile villages of Daanbantayan and Medellin usually reside in uphill or coastal communities and work within the agricultural sector or journey to the capital for employment. That signifies that for essentially the most half, wages are depending on work for the day.
On October 3, Medellin resident Jaime Setenta advised Rappler that affected residents couldn’t work in the course of the first week of the aftermath as some institutions had closed down.
On the time, companies weren’t coping with simply structural issues, but additionally energy outages and a scarcity of water provide. Many grocery shops quickly ceased operations till gentle may return. Comfort shops — whose glass partitions have been broken from the quake — have been cordoned off or had makeshift indicators indicating they have been out of enterprise, a minimum of quickly.
Residents who owned sari-sari (sundry shops) that fashioned a part of their houses additionally closed down by default both as a result of no electrical energy or structural harm.
LGUs are victims, too
Daanbantayan Mayor Gilbert Arrabis Jr. advised Rappler on Tuesday, October 14, that harm evaluation and rehabilitation have been a problem for his or her city, particularly for the reason that municipal corridor couldn’t be used.
“We’re engaged on getting non permanent workplaces at a brand new location,” the mayor mentioned. The town’s totally different companies had arrange outside “tent” workplaces to keep up municipal operations and help residents with processing paperwork for issues like burial help.
As of the second week of October, Arrabis mentioned, the city has carried out surveys with residents who could also be eligible for housing help.
The problem? Validating knowledge for broken homes owned by greater than 32,600 households in Daanbantayan requires loads of time and human assets.
That is on high of the already hefty work they do with reduction distributions in coordination with barangay officers.
San Remigio Mayor Mariano Martinez advised Rappler on Tuesday, October 14, that cities additionally can’t conduct repairs instantly as a result of doable dangers to residents.
The mayor defined that parts of the city’s water techniques, significantly some cistern tanks in deep wells, are affected by the aftershocks.
“We can’t go all the way down to restore as a result of the realm continues to be experiencing tremors,” the mayor mentioned.
Even conducting clearing operations alongside the city’s rivers that have been clogged as a result of quake-induced landslides couldn’t be achieved as a result of chance of flash floods, Martinez added.
The mayor admitted that their catastrophe preparations and methods have been primarily meant to fight the extreme results of tropical cyclones, very similar to when Tremendous Hurricane Odette hit Cebu in 2021.
“No person is staying inside our evacuation facilities, nobody is staying of their homes due to the worry of [collapsing structures]…all our methods we’ve simply discovered can’t be used for earthquakes,” the mayor mentioned.
Native first, at all times
Native legal guidelines — the Philippine Catastrophe Threat Discount and Administration (DRRM) Act of 2010 and the Native Authorities Code of 1991 — make it clear that it’s the LGU that’s on the forefront of catastrophe preparedness and response.
Cities, cities, and provinces are anticipated to have plans in place to mitigate the chance of each man-made and pure disasters, put together for and reply to doable crises successfully, and devise plans to rehabilitate within the aftermath of those occasions.
In response to the DRRM Act, the Native Catastrophe Threat Discount and Administration Council (LDRRMC) ought to lead preparedness, response, and restoration efforts based mostly on the next standards:
- The Barangay Growth Councils, if a barangay is affected
- The town/municipal DRRMCs, If two (2) or extra barangays are affected
- The provincial DRRMC, if two (2) or extra cities/municipalities are affected
- The regional DRRMC, if two (2) or extra provinces are affected
- The NDRRMC, if two (2) or extra areas are affected
In any respect ranges, each the Nationwide Catastrophe Threat Discount and Administration Council (NDRRMC) and the upper LDRRMC are anticipated to “act as assist to LGUs which have the first duty as first catastrophe responders.”
“Non-public sector and civil society teams shall work in accordance with the coordination mechanism and insurance policies set by the NDRRMC and anxious LDRRMCs,” the legislation stipulates.
Within the case of Cebu, since a metropolis and several other cities in northern Cebu have been affected, it’s the provincial degree that’s supposed to guide all phases in danger discount and administration.
Veterans of catastrophe response would be the first to let you know that post-earthquake reduction and restoration may be tougher than efforts to organize for and reply to a hurricane or heavy rain.
There’s no preemptive evacuation for an earthquake, exterior of convincing individuals to depart houses in previously-marked hazard areas. Buildings which can be usually used to accommodate the displaced — devoted evacuation facilities and even faculties — aren’t at all times usable within the quick and longer-term aftermath of a powerful earthquake as a result of they, too, can maintain harm.
In essence, the guidelines — meals packs, non permanent shelter, psychosocial assist, and rehabilitation assist, amongst others — stays the identical, besides that there’s no prepositioning or advance warning to talk of.
So robust was the 6.9 earthquake {that a} floor rupture was found within the village of Nailon close to the northern shore of Bogo Metropolis. The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology has since named it the Bogo Bay Fault — an lively fault that’s distinct from the Bogo Fault.
Catastrophe and politics
Cebu Provincial Board Member Celestino “Tining” Martinez III requested throughout a board session on October 6, “the place the provincial authorities was” when it comes to reporting and response efforts.
“What’s the plan shifting ahead, the place are we with our coordination with the LGUs?” Martinez requested.
The provincial board member premised the dearth of a transparent plan on social media posts claiming that reduction items had been immediately distributed from the province to the barangays, with out the data of public officers like himself.
Cebu fifth District Congressman Duke Frasco, in a press release on October 9, recommended the provincial board members for talking out on what he referred to as a failure of management of the provincial authorities.
“For selecting to talk the reality, Board Member Tining is now being bullied and attacked on social media by the same old mouthpieces and trolls of his topic, one thing I’m all too aware of,” Frasco mentioned.
Bogo Metropolis Mayor Maria Cielo “Mayel” Martinez, the board member’s sister, additionally criticized how representatives of the Provincial Social Welfare and Growth Workplace (PSWDO) and Provincial Catastrophe Threat Discount and Administration Workplace (PDRRMO) got here to their metropolis solely on October 9 to ask for knowledge when they need to have been current within the earlier components of the aftermath.
“What we wanted then have been expert individuals with experience in catastrophe response to assist the incident command heart. Thus, the query, ‘the place is the provincial authorities’?” the mayor mentioned in a social media put up.
After all, there’s some political friction, as a majority of the districts within the north are led by politicians who belong to the still-ruling One Cebu occasion, led by former governor and defeated 2025 re-electionist Gwen Garcia. It’s Garcia’s rival, Pamela Baricuatro, who now sits on the provincial capitol.
In the course of the 2025 midterm elections, the Martinez-ruled Bogo had voted in favor of Garcia with 27,181 votes over Baricuatro’s 16,554 votes.
A plan for the longer term
Dynamics between the LGUs and the provincial authorities have improved for the reason that preliminary phases of catastrophe response, with native officers assembly on the provincial capitol on October 10.
There, the governor convened the Provincial Rehabilitation and Restoration Council (PRRC) to debate plans, formulate clusters with native companies for particular response duties, and centralize efforts for rehabilitation and restoration.
Previous to this, on October 8, the provincial authorities introduced the discharge of P120 million for infrastructure restoration and rehabilitation for the affected cities and metropolis, on high of a further P38 million from the province’s calamity fund.
One other P350 million for the rehabilitation of roads and bridges can also be set to be launched, in keeping with the Cebu provincial public info workplace.
The nationwide authorities has additionally pledged over P255 million to assist Cebu’s rehabilitation.
In a social media put up on October 11, Baricuatro mentioned that she understood the worry and skepticism that adopted the September 30 earthquake however clarified that each motion taken instantly after the quake was achieved with urgency and transparency.
“We is not going to be deterred by politics…We’ll stay accountable, clear, and relentlessly centered on saving lives,” the governor mentioned.
As officers within the provincial complicated, and in metropolis and city halls map out clearer plans for post-quake rehabilitation and restoration, Rebecca Cañete has a singular, pressing concern in thoughts: for tarpaulins, and possibly some assist, to succeed in her and her neighborhood earlier than one other storm hits her city.
“Sa gawas man mi matulog. Kinahanglan gyud ang trapal,” she mentioned. (We’re going to be sleeping exterior. Tarpaulins are essential.) – Rappler.com
