Ulysses leaves 18 months of trash in Marikina

MANILA, Philippines — The devastation brought by Typhoon Ulyssess left Marikina City with garbage equivalent to one and a half years of trash, Mayor Marcelino Teodoro said yesterday.

Teodoro said they have cleared over the past 11 days about 45 percent of the debris that clogged their roads.

“The debris we are collecting is equivalent to one and a half years of garbage to be collected in the city. That’s 980,000 cubic meters of debris,” he said in an interview over ANC.

Teodoro said it might take them until the end of the month of the first week of December to remove all the debris along to the city’s secondary roads and alleys.

“That’s one reason why people can’t access their houses at this point in time,” he said.

Of the 10,500 families evacuated during the typhoon, only 1,050 are still in evacuation centers while the rest have returned to their homes.

An initial assessment by the city government showed that around 500 houses either sustained damage or were destroyed by the typhoon.

Meanwhile, five evacuees in the city have contracted COVID-19. Teodoro said the patients, two of them senior citizens, are under observation at their quarantine facility.

“They are all asymptomatic and in stable condition,” he said.

Go sends aid

Meanwhile, the office of Sen. Bong Go delivered assistance on Monday to 350 families given shelter at the Barangka Elementary School.

The distribution activity is a continuation of a series of relief efforts by Go’s office to families affected by the typhoon.

On Nov. 16, Go led the distribution of assistance to nearly 8,000 individuals in Marikina. His office distributed assistance to more than 1,600 families from Nov. 17 to 21.

Go’s office provided meals, food packs, face masks and shields and vitamins to the families.