Field survey and damage inspection after the 2013 Typhoon Haiyan in The Philippines

Abstract

On November 8, 2013 a powerful tropical cyclone, named as Super Typhoon Haiyan, struck the areas of Southeast Asian countries. The Eastern Visayas in the Philippines was one of the most affected regions due to the high winds and storm surge that inundated and destroyed more than one million houses. In Leyte and Samar islands, approximately 6,268 people were killed. In addition, the Daniel Z. Romualdez (DZR) Airport, located at the Leyte Island in the city of Tacloban, was heavily damaged. In this paper, we briefly describe the damage and inundation mapping effort carried out using satellite imagery and the observations gathered during a field survey conducted in January 2014 with the leadership of the International Research Institute of Disaster Science (IRIDeS) of Tohoku University. The field survey team inspected the affected areas to grasp the inundation extent and comprehend the mechanisms of structural and building damage through inspection and measurement of inundation heights. In addition, survivors were interviewed during the field survey, their experiences of evacuation are summarized here.