Flash floods have devastated a southern Philippines region unaccustomed to serious storms, killing at least 450 people while they slept.
The United Nations has chosen Monday to mark the globe’s seven-billionth birth symbolically, sparking a string of festivities worldwide.
A strong typhoon off the Philippines’ mountainous north forced authorities to close schools in the capital for a second day on Thursday as disaster-response teams braced for possible floods and landslides. Typhoon Sepat was roaring over the Pacific Ocean with sustained winds of 185km/h and gusts of up to 220km/h.
Cocooned in rural seclusion, Donsol, a placid little town, long kept a big but unintended secret: In the first half of the year, the sea swarms with the world’s largest fish. Whale sharks — some as big as a bus — have put on an annual show for local folks for generations, roaming close to shore and seemingly unafraid of humans, who left the fish alone.
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/ 13 September 2005
Huge blasts at a suburban Manila police ammunition dump injured at least 107 people, damaged several buildings and homes and set off security jitters in a capital long wary of possible terror attacks and a coup, officials said. Police ruled out sabotage or terrorism. The explosions were apparently touched off by lightning.