May 10, 2011
MANILA (AFP) - Fifteen people were killed and nearly 70,000 people were forced from their homes as tropical storm Aere pummelled the Philippines, the government said Tuesday.
The death toll from Aere, which hit on Sunday, was raised from nine, with six more people reported killed in floods, landslides and road accidents, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Center said.
However, after two days of heavy rains across the main island of Luzon, the storm had weakened and was exiting the northern Philippines on Tuesday morning, according to the national weather bureau.
"(The storm) is moving away from the country in a north, northeast direction," the bureau said, adding it was expected to move close to Japan's southwest coast by Thursday.
It said Aere's maximum sustained winds had fallen to 65 kilometres (40.3 miles) an hour, from 85 kilometres (52.7 miles) an hour on Sunday.
The disaster agency said that nearly 70,000 people had been forced to leave their storm-hit homes on Luzon, and the initial estimate of damages to the farming sector was more than $2.7 million.
