Albay landslide survivor: ‘I didn’t know why and how I made it’
GUINOBATAN, ALBAY—The chapel in Maguiron village serves as the funeral home for the three members of the Orfano family in this town. Rolando Orfano, 54, sat at the chapel’s entrance with his traumatized dog Putim on Saturday morning, still bewildered why he survived while his family—wife, daughter and mother — did not.
Orfano survived a landslide that engulfed his home during the onslaught of Severe Tropical Storm “Kristine” (international name: Trami) on Tuesday evening, but his wife Florenia, 49, and daughter Mary Grace, 19, did not make it.
His mother Leonida, 79, was still rescued at 10 p.m. on Tuesday after soil and hollow blocks from their home covered half of her body. However, she, too, was pronounced dead at a local hospital at 1 a.m. on Wednesday.
At 8 p.m. on Oct. 22, the members of his family were all sleeping but Orfano stayed awake, worried about the storm.
“It sounded as though somebody was drilling through our walls, and then I didn’t know how I got out. Before I knew it, I was already out of our house,” Orfano told the Inquirer on Oct. 26.
The force of the landslide pushed Rolando out of the house. His immediate thought was to dig the earth to save this family, but digging the soil with his hands did not help. When he heard her mother screaming for help, he found her half buried in the landslide. It took him and their neighbors almost two hours to free her.
The only other living survivor from Orfano’s household was his 15-year-old nephew, who was also in the portion of the house where his mother was sleeping. He was also buried, but survived the incident.
Florenia’s body was retrieved at 10 a.m. of Oct. 23 while Mary Grace was recovered at 6 p.m. on the same day. Rolando said he always believed that the house he had lived his entire life was safe even if was located at the back of a hill.
“The last time we evacuated was during [Supertyphoon] ‘Reming’ [that hit on Nov. 30, 2006]. I am 54 years old now, I grew up there. My mother has been staying there since the ’60s,” Rolando said. “For the longest time, typhoons, rain, whatever happens, we have never experienced a landslide.”
Rolando said that the top of the hill used to be a Citizen Armed Force Geographical Unit (Cafgu) camp, which he said could have caused the soil to soften.
“They put foxholes. (Probably) the holes could not bear the amount of rain so it burst,” he said.
Guinobatan town listed the three Orfanos as its lone casualties. Throughout the Bicol region, however, the Office of Civil Defense (OCD) in the region already counted 34 persons whose deaths were attributed to the storm.
Help from neighbors
Rolando recalled that even in the dark, his neighbors came to help rescue his family.
Nico Magante, 23, who lives next door but whose house was miraculously spared, told the Inquirer that everyone’s flashlights were already out of battery, so they were using the lights from their phones.
“We could not get them out of the rubble because the wall that fell on them was heavy, so we waited for the rescue’s help,” Magante said.
The residents said the rescue team arrived at 10 p.m.
“It was scary because it was still raining,” Magante said. “It was important for us [to help them] because when we saw their situation, it was pitiful hearing them (Leonida and the nephew) asking for help.”
Joy Maravillas, the town’s disaster risk reduction and management officer, said the flood at the town proper has subsided but the upland areas were still inundated on Oct. 26 and roadside landslides made it hard to reach these areas.
At that time, the municipal government was also getting ready for the effects of then Tropical Storm “Leon” (international name: Kong-Rey), that just entered the country. So far, Kristine has caused at least 11 landslides and has flooded 792 villages throughout Bicol, according to the OCD.
