MANILA: Typhoon Yinxing slammed into the northeast tip of the Philippines on Thursday, uprooting trees and sending building materials flying, weeks after another storm left at least 150 people dead.

More than 21,000 people across 200 villages in Cagayan province were evacuated in the hours before the mid-afternoon landfall, provincial disaster official Rueli Rapsing said. “There is debris flying all around. Here in Gonzaga, an entire hamburger stand flew off and the winds are ripping open the shop doors at the public market,” Rapsing told AFP by phone from Gonzaga, a town near coastal Santa Ana.

Yinxing is the third storm in less than a month to threaten the Philippines after Severe Tropical Storm Trami and Super Typhoon Kong-rey together left 158 people dead, the national disaster agency said, with most of that tally attributed to Trami. Packing maximum sustained wind speeds of 175 kilometers (109 miles) per hour and gusts up to 240 kph, the typhoon struck the coastal town of Santa Ana and nearby areas, unleashing heavy rain and ripping off parts of houses. Rapsing said the storm had uprooted trees and authorities were trying to confirm reports that the Santa Ana police station had been damaged. No casualties were immediately reported.

The Cagayan provincial government’s disaster response was being conducted from a public building in Gonzaga, he said. Santa Ana officials could not be reached for comment. 

The national weather agency said Cagayan, home to about 1.3 million people, might bear the brunt of Yinxing based on its current trajectory. In Ilocos Norte province near Cagayan, rescuers were on standby to help local police, fire officers and soldiers in emergency response, provincial rescue official Randy Nicolas told AFP.

Nicolas said they are closely monitoring possible landslides, floods and swelling of rivers in the province, with storm surges—huge waves along the coast, also a concern in Ilocos Norte and Cagayan. Disaster officials in the mountainous province of Apayao said almost 500 people have been evacuated. “We really prioritized preemptive evacuations because we want to have zero deaths here in Apayao,” provincial disaster official Aldrin Agmata told AFP.

The state weather service said Yinxing would scrape past the north coast of the main island of Luzon overnight Thursday before blowing out into the South China Sea on Friday.

School has been suspended in many areas of the north and President Ferdinand Marcos put all government agencies on high alert so they can swiftly respond.

“Remember, every life is important so we should always be prepared,” Marcos said in a statement on Wednesday. – AFP