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Typhoon Fengshen has killed at least 19 people in the Philippines and is hampering efforts to rescue more than 700 people aboard a ferry adrift in the storm.
Rough seas and large waves forced Philippine coast guard crews to turn back in their attempt to reach the "Princess of the Stars."
Authorities say the ship is "dead in the water" off the coast of central Sibuyan island. The ferry's crew reported it had run aground and was listing shortly before radio contact was lost with the ship.
The ferry was carrying 626 passengers and 121 crew members when it lost engine power after being battered by the storm.
The typhoon has winds of 195 kilometers per hour and has triggered deadly floods and landslides in the southern Philippines.
Authorities say heavy rain caused a river in the town of Upi in southern Maguindanao province to overflow, washing away several houses and killing at least 10 people. Officials say at least five others are missing.
In nearby Cotabato city, a landslide buried several houses in a slum area, killing at least two people.
Officials warned residents in low-lying and mountainous areas of possible flash floods and landslides, while those in coastal areas were told to watch out for large waves.
Weather forecasters say the storm will move west, leaving the islands Sunday night, and heading toward China.
Authorities have suspended domestic airline flights and ferry service to the central Philippines because of the storm.
The Typhoon is over us at the moment. It has weakened quite a bit but the winds are still about 100kmph in gusts. We have some trees down and the power was out but it just came back up.
"Frank" as it's named locally, should be out of the Philippines by tonight. I have no idea why that ferry was out there, the ports are usually closed depending on the strength of the Typhoon. I hope those people will survive, the winds should be dying down there.
This is again very sad. But please let us not forget the typhoon that struck Burma - there, largely as a consequence of an evil dictatorship, tens of thousands of people have already died and hundreds of thousands more look like following them. This is by far the worst tragedy in the world at the moment, and it's largely dropped out of public view.
Yes Peter, the Burma storm was horrible and still is. The world wanted to help, but the Generals would not allow it - which is kinda outside the scope of this board to discuss I think. Very sad tho, indeed.
Bad News: The Ferry Has Sunk Currently 12:27pm Sunday (PHT) - Time in Philippines
MANILA, June 22 (Reuters) - A ferry with more than 700 people sank off the coast of the central Philippines in winds and high waves caused by Typhoon Fengshen and at least four people were killed, local officials said on Sunday.
"I sent a speed boat to check," Nanette Tansingco, a mayor of the coastal town of Romblon province, told local radio.
"They saw the boat upside down with a big hole in the hull."
She said at least four bodies were found and childrens' slippers were scattered on the shoreline.
The MV Princess of Stars stalled in rough seas near Sibuyan island on Saturday with 626 passengers and 121 crew on board as Fengshen, with winds gusting up to 195 kph (121 mph), ripped through the Philippines archipelago.
Coast guard vessels were unable to reach the ferry due to high waves and winds.
"We were told that at around 5 am the captain sounded the abandon ship signal," said Lieutenant General Pedro Inserto, military commander in the Visayas, the central region of the Philippines.
MANILA, Philippines (CNN) -- Filipino authorities hope that 749 people missing after their ferry capsized in a typhoon are still alive inside an air pocket, the head of the country's Red Cross said Sunday.
"It's a race against time," said Sen. Richard Gordon, who is head of the Philippines Red Cross.
"There is a bubble in the ship's bowels that are now on top of the surface of the water, and we are now trying to get assistance from our own government to get divers down into the vessel as soon as the seas calm," he said.
Typhoon Fengshen has killed between 120 and 150 people in the Philippines, he said, noting that he has not heard from Red Cross chapters in the country's remote areas.
The Filipino government may ask the U.S. Navy to send in seaborne helicopters and divers who can help "recover people who may be alive under the ship," Gordon said.
The crew of the MV Princess of Stars reported Saturday that it ran aground after its engine failed during its regular run between Manila and Cebu City, according to Vice Adm. Wilfredo Tamayo.
Radio contact with the ship was lost Saturday afternoon, Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Armando Balilo said.
The ferry capsized near the central Philippine island of Sibuyan, carrying 130 crew members and more than 600 passengers, Gordon said. Only four survivors and 10 bodies have been found, he said.
The effort to reach the ferry has been slowed by rough seas stirred up by Typhoon Fengshen, which made landfall in the eastern Philippines early Saturday.
The ferry, which can weather rough seas, embarked during "Typhoon signal No. 1," which indicated there was no impending danger, Gordon said.
"But unfortunately the typhoon suddenly turned and it [became] Typhoon signal No. 3, which has now created a really, really bad problem," he said. "After that, I think the ship ran into some problems -- we're not sure about that yet -- and it drifted to seashore, ran aground and eventually capsized."
The families of the ferry passengers are "very bitter about the situation," he said.
"Obviously there's a lot of angry people among the ship's families, and I just spoke with them," he said, adding that he told grieving relatives that the Red Cross is there to "alleviate human suffering and we're doing our best right now to try to get that done."
"But we still have to reckon with the fact that the typhoon is still ravaging central Luzon."
Typhoon Fengshen was reported to have top sustained winds of 110 mph, though the storm lost strength after moving ashore.
Fengshen is still moving across the Philippines, dumping torrential rains fueled by 75 mph winds as it pushes toward Manila, according to the Filipino Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration.
The ferry lost power and being dead in the water, was washed onto a reef. Some life boats were launched but overturned in the high seas according to one survivor.
Dennis, aren't Romblon and Subuyan islands just off northwest Panay? Isn't Subuyan the one you can see west of Boracay?
Where are you, if you dont' mind me asking?
May God be with all the survivors out at sea.
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