Ferry disaster operations center set up in City Hall
Mayor Celso Lobregat initiates a meeting of the Regional and City Disaster Coordinating Councils Tuesday morning in City Hall where the creation of an operations center to synchronize information relative to the Sunday Superferry 9 disaster was finalized. (JOEY BAUTISTA)
A disaster operations center tasked to synchronize information relative to the ongoing rescue and relief operations for survivors of the ill-fated MV SuperFerry 9 has been established in City Hall.
This was agreed during a meeting initiated by Mayor Celso Lobregat yesterday and attended by members of the Regional and City disaster Coordinating Councils and agencies concerned in the rescue as well as relief operations in the Superferry 9 tragedy Sunday.
Regional Police Chief Supt. Angelo Sungalo who is RDCC chair, Rear Admiral Alexander Pama, commander of Naval Forces Western Mindanao, Commodore Rodolfo Isorena of the Philippine Coast Guard and Capt. Erden G. Ferrer of Aboitiz Transport System (ATS), owner and operator of SuprFerry 9 were among the key figures who attended the meeting.
Mayor Lobregat said the center is open 24/7, particularly to inquiries on the whereabouts of the survivors, medical and hospitalization assistance. It is manned by representatives of Philippine Coast Guard, Navy, Philippine National Police, Philippine National Red Cross, City Social Welfare and Development Office, City Health Office, and Smart Communications which provided the free mobile phone No. 09286404597.
As this developed, Ferrer thanked members of the RDCC, especially the Coast Guard, the Army, the Navy, the PNP, the city government under Lobregat’s administration and all the “unsung heroes” for extending assistance to the victims of the sea tragedy.
“We feel responsible for this. We will do what we can and we promise you we will assist (the victims) in whatever way we can to mitigate the effect on the survivors,” Ferrer told the joint RDCC-CDCC meeting in City Hall yesterday.
He said the company is still consolidating the number of survivors brought to Zamboanga City even as he admitted to certain discrepancies in figures vis-à-vis the number of rescued passengers and that of the manifesto. “The figures are a bit confusing but this is usually the case in times like these because many people want to help,” he said, adding “we have our teams making the rounds of different hospitals and hotels to consolidate all these figures.”
Ferrer said the insurance company had agreed to pay the survivors P6,000 for baggage allowance and P5,000 financial assistance for a total of P11,000 each.
As of yesterday, 977 passengers and crew members had been rescued. Of these, 15 were scheduled to take a bus yesterday for General Santos City and 15 more opted to take a plane for Manila. About 36 others including children are confined in different hospitals while the rest are still billeted in local hotels. Bodies of the nine fatalities have also been recovered—6 of them brought to Zamboanga City while 3 were brought to Bacolod from the rescue site Sunday. Those brought to La Merced, this city are identified as Fe Panaguiton, Ferdinand Apolonio, Charisma Amper, James Patrick Galero, Rolando Crespo and Remedios Langrio.
Meanwhile, Gen. Sunglao said rescue operations are still ongoing in the sea of Zamboanga del Norte even as he believed that all passengers and crew members of the ill-fated ferry had already been rescued by commercial vessels, the Coast Guard and fishermen.
He also thanked the municipal mayors of Siocon, Sirawai and Sibuco in Zamboanga del Norte for helping in the rescue operations right after the ferry sank off these coastal towns. Specifically, he commended Lobregat for the efficient and well-organized relief operations for the survivors at the terminal of the Philippine Ports Authority.
“It was an exceptional show of the Bayanihan system where everybody in government and private sector came to the rescue of the survivors,” Sunglao said.
Also present during the meeting were Sr. Supt. Amador Corpus, officer-in-charge of the Zamboanga City Police Office, Lt. Col. Antonio Sotelo, operations chief of the 3rd Air Division of the Philippine Air Force, Archbishop Romulo Valles, City Administrator Antonio Orendain Jr. Chief Executive Assistant Roseller Natividad, City Health Officer Rodel Agbulos, City Social Welfare and Development Officer Francisco Barredo, Red Cross Administrator Victor Liozo Jr., representatives from the Brent Hospital, Zamboanga Doctors’ Hospital, Western Mindanao Medical Center, La Merced Memorial Home and several other personalities. (Vic Larato)