The aftermath of Tropical Storm Nalgae in the Philippines | Climate News

Authorities in the Philippines have raised the death toll from last week’s flooding and landslides set off by a storm to more than 110 people.

Thirty-three people were still missing and more than 100 people were injured, according to the country’s disaster agency.

Tropical Storm Nalgae was the second-most destructive storm to hit the Philippines so far this year – after tropical storm Megi killed 214 people in April.

On Tuesday, Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr ordered officials to distribute relief packs faster and called for better preparation ahead of four more tropical storms forecast by the weather agency before the end of the year.

“When we were doing aerial inspection, I noticed that landslides occurred in denuded mountains and that was the problem,” said Marcos, who conducted an aerial inspection over a southern province hit by landslides and visited an evacuation centre in Maguindanao province.

Most of the casualties from Nalgae, the country’s 14th cyclone this year, were in the southern autonomous region of Bangsamoro because of rain-induced landslides in deforested areas.

The Philippines, an archipelago of more than 7,600 islands, sees an average of 20 typhoons a year, with frequent landslides and floods blamed on the growing intensity of tropical cyclones due to climate change.