Typhoon Parma kills 17 in Philippines

Manila_(dpa) _ A powerful typhoon that pummelled the north-eastern Philippines killed 17 people in floods and landslides, but the overall damage was less than expected, officials said Sunday.

The victims included seven people who died when a landslide swept a house at the edge of a ravine in Itogon town in Benguet province, 210 kilometres north of Manila, said Senior Superintendent Loreto Espinili, the provincial police commander.

The bodies of the victims, who included two children, were found at the foot of the 200-metre ravine.

Espinili said five people were also killed in a landslide in nearby La Trinidad town also in Benguet.

The National Disaster Coordinating Council said one man died when he fell from his roof and a 2-year-old drowned while crossing a swollen spillway in the eastern province of Camarines Sur.

One man died from hypothermia and another drowned in floods in the northern province of Isabela, while one was swept by away by strong river currents in Pangasinan province, police said.

Typhoon Parma slammed into the Philippines on Saturday with maximum winds of 175 kilometres per hour (kph) and gusts of up to 210 kph, forcing nearly 170,000 people to flee their homes amid warnings of devastating effects.

It toppled trees, ripped roofs off houses, and downed electricity and communication lines in the affected provinces in the northern Philippines.

Forceful winds and floods damaged crops while landslides blocked roads in the provinces of Cagayan, Isabela, Aurora and Benguet, as well as in the eastern region of Bicol.

"The damages were minimal considering the strength of the storm," said Lieutenant Colonel Ernesto Torres, a spokesman for the National Disaster Coordinating Council. "We can attribute this to the preemptive measures we undertook to mitigate the impact."

Parma spared Manila and surrounding provinces that were devastated by the worst flooding in over 40 years caused by storm Ketsana, which killed 288 people with 42 still missing.

Over 3 million people were still recovering from the floods, including more than 370,000 staying in evacuation centres.

The weather bureau said Parma has weakened after crossing extreme northern Philippines on its way out to the South China Sea.

The typhoon, however, was almost stationary between the Philippines' northern tip and Taiwan. It was now packing maximum winds of 120 kph and gusts of up to 150 kph. dpa gl jg tl