Only thirteen months since Super Typhoon Haiyan devastated parts of the Philippines, the region is again under threat from a large typhoon. Typhoon Hagupit, locally referred to as Typhoon Ruby, is currently Category 4 strength and expected to make landfall over the weekend.
Hagupit isn’t forecast to be as strong as Typhoon Haiyan; however, its projected path takes it across southern Luzon Island, as well as an area 35 miles south of the Central Capitol Region that has a high concentration of exposure at risk of substantial wind damage.
As the typhoon makes landfall, there is also the potential for storm surge along low-lying coastal areas, which are characterized by complex coastlines and bays.
At this stage,there still remains a large degree of uncertainty surrounding Hagupit’s forecast track, intensity, and landfall locations, which the RMS catastrophe response team is monitoring closely.
High concentrations of exposure at risk
The Central Capitol Region includes Quezon City, the largest city in the Philippines, as well as Manila, which is the second largest city and serves as the capitol. This region has the highest concentration of economic insurable exposure ($165.5 billion), which accounts for approximately 20 percent of the country’s total insurable exposure. Using the RMS Economic Exposure datasets, we can see that $91 billion is residential, $59 billion commercial, and $14.4 billion is industrial exposure. Quezon City has the highest value of insurable exposure with $32.3 billion, of which 65 percent is commercial.
In addition, our Industrial Clusters Catalog shows that a high proportion of industrial clusters could be impacted by Hagupit. These are located in the surrounding districts of Rizal and Laguna within the Calabarzon region, as well as the Lima Technology Center, which is in the direct path of typhoon.
Despite being forecast to making landfall further north than Typhoon Haiyan, Hagupit is still likely to affect areas that are still recovering from the impacts of Typhoon Haiyan.
Lessons from Typhoon Haiyan Reconnaissance
Typhoon Haiyan illustrated that the complex geometry and shallow water where Haiyan made landfall can give rise to significant storm surge heights, evidenced by high surge levels experienced in San Pedro and San Pablo Bays, affecting Tacloban City. The Philippines is characterized by these complex coastlines and shallow waters, and future typhoon events, including Typhoon Hagupit, could similarly cause significant storm surge in other areas of the Philippines.
In the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan, our scientists conducted extensive field reconnaissance work. They observed that buildings were structurally more resilient to typhoon winds because of the region’s high risk of earthquakes. There is abundant use of reinforced concrete frames, which ensures the structural integrity of the buildings for earthquakes and winds.
Wind alone did not cause substantial structural damage to structures built with reinforced concrete; however, the severe storm surge flooding caused the failure of some reinforced concrete framed buildings. Instead, wind damage was most evident to the roofing of buildings, particularly light aluminum roofs. Large span commercial and industrial light metal roofs collapsed, but concrete roof tiles preformed better.
Since Haiyan, the Filipino government has been actively discussing sponsoring a catastrophe bond with the World Bank, but the process is complex and will take time to develop.
