[Inside the Newsroom] For many people in Cebu, it was the top of the world

‘There’s a world the place this couldn’t have been anticipated. This isn’t that world.’

When Ernest Ocasiones awoke earlier than daybreak on Tuesday, November 4, the flood that entered his room was ankle-deep. By the point he referred to as for his youngsters and swung open the entrance door, it had reached his knees. By the point they received to their automobile, it was at their waist.

After I requested him how far he believed the water made it when he had fled his dwelling, he pointed to a spot on the wall taller than himself.

He thought it was the top of the world.

Howdy there. I’m Aidan Bernales, a group progress and growth specialist at Rappler. I don’t normally discover myself on the bottom. I do my work from home, the place a secure web connection is all I must play my half within the publication, discovering methods for our tales to achieve extra readers such as you.

However when Hurricane Tino (Kalmaegi) hit my hometown of Cebu, the story discovered its option to me.

I watched a complete riverside group disappear into the Butuanon River, which runs behind my home and precipitated the automobile pileup you’ve most likely seen on-line.

When the flood subsided, I returned to the place it had overflowed. Not a single makeshift dwelling stood. A bit of the riprap meant to guard the realm was bitten off by the present. All that was left was a hole cement body stuffed with sand and gravel dredged from the riverbed, nowhere close to as tall as or sturdy sufficient to face up to a flood of that proportion.

Rappler’s areas reporter, John Sitchon, had lined that very same river and its weak flood management constructions in September, when a single flooding incident broken the ripraps constructed solely a 12 months earlier than. He wrote then that it was a “race in opposition to time” to repair the challenge earlier than the subsequent catastrophe. 

Clearly, that point has run out.

There’s a world the place this couldn’t have been anticipated. SunStar Cebu, certainly one of Rappler’s NewsCollabPH companions, reported that, on the morning of November 4, Cebu obtained 183 millimeters of rainfall — greater than a month’s price of rain in only a single day. It was the deadliest storm of 2025.

How may now we have fought that? That rainfall felt like a focused assassination by nature. Put that within the wake of a magnitude 6.9 earthquake, and it’s a punishment straight out of the Previous Testomony.

That was what I noticed in Cotcot, Liloan, certainly one of Cebu’s hardest-hit cities. With no web, I took my reporting offline, chatting with emergency responders in a muddy, candle-lit barangay corridor. That they had aimed for zero casualties, however it was practically not possible to attain. Our bodies have been swept down from the mountains, houses have been cleaned, automobiles flung into one another like toys, and scores of individuals have been nonetheless lacking. By nightfall, that they had barely rested earlier than returning to seek for the lifeless at nighttime. (WATCH: Liloan struggles to get better after lethal floods)

All of them agreed on one factor: That they had by no means seen something prefer it earlier than.

Rappler columnist Raymund E. Narag credit this catastrophe to a “end result of years of white-collar crimes,” the place corruption and revenue triumphed over security. Clearly, that sentiment rings true as prices pile up in opposition to Cebuano mayors who reportedly vacationed in London the week their cities drowned, whereas the Division of Surroundings and Pure Assets probes a star architect whose Banaue-inspired hillside challenge could have contributed to flooding in neighboring barangays.

As I mentioned, there’s a world the place this couldn’t have been anticipated. This isn’t that world.

Individuals demanded solutions, to know what was occurring to their nation, and Rappler was there to report them. Sitchon returned to Liloan to seek out households nonetheless ready for help. Photographer Jacqueline Hernandez documented the burials. Researcher Shay Du tracked down the contractors within the Visayas cities the place Tino was deadliest. 

We’re nonetheless at it. Our creating tales web page continues to gather updates. Our aid web page connects donors to organizations offering meals and necessities. Each story, picture, and replace you see takes hours of labor, typically in harmful and exhausting circumstances.

It was imagined to be the top of the world. But, in some way, the times saved passing. New storms, like Tremendous Hurricane Uwan (Fung-wong), entered, engulfed, and exited. Political scandals broke. Christmas retains coming nearer. Quickly, Tino will change into a reminiscence, simply one other retired title from a storm checklist, diminished to numbers and infographics.

However for many who misplaced every thing, for the daughter nonetheless looking for her mom, for the households who’ve to begin from scratch, this story doesn’t finish. And Rappler is taking it upon itself to verify the devastation endured isn’t forgotten. 

We’ll proceed to inform these tales, to carry these in energy under consideration, and to maintain the reminiscence of this tragedy alive.

In the event you imagine in journalism that doesn’t look away even when the world is drowning, assist Rappler by becoming a member of Rappler+ or donating to our investigative fund. – Rappler.com