After a weekend of heavy rains and winds, Hagupit was downgraded from a typhoon after slowly moving west across the country. Samar, where the storm first made landfall Saturday was the worst hit, but the damage caused by the storm was less than feared. Nearly one million people were relocated to evacuations centers and many are now heading home.

Roberta Cappieri, Concern’s operations support officer based in Concepcion in the Western Visayas region, said a lot of advanced warning in the barangays, or villages, allowed people to pre-evacuate the elderly and less mobile, tie down houses and boats, and stockpile essential items. If the current storm path holds, it is likely that Hagupit will not hit the region directly, but could still cause damage and flooding. “Everyone seems like they felt prepared, but very nervous about what will happen next, especially to all the things they just rebuilt,” said Roberta.

Samar, where the storm first made landfall Saturday was the worst hit, but the damage caused by the storm was less than feared.

The Philippines is one of the most vulnerable countries to extreme weather, with about 20 typhoons hitting it each year. Last year, Super-Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest recorded storms ever to make landfall, killed more than 7,000 people and left another four million homeless or with damaged houses.

Helping Communities Recover from Super-typhoon Haiyan

For the past year, Concern has been working with the poorest, most vulnerable, and hardest-to-reach communities living in along the coastlines and on small islands in the western Visayas region. With the future in mind, our teams are helping families recover from Super-Typhoon Haiyan. This includes repairing and replacing damaged boats to restore fishermen’s livelihoods and rehabilitating mangroves and coral reefs to replenish fish stocks; rebuilding schools in Concepcion to get children back into safe classrooms; and building water pipelines under the seabed to restore fresh water supply for island communities.