Cape Town - It was one of the worst-hit regions when Typhoon Haiyan tore through the Philippines. But 11 days after the storm flattened villages, cut off clean water supplies and brought down electricity in the area - large parts of Western Leyte are still without relief.
On Tuesday, the Gift of the Givers organisation will head to the region, setting up camp in Palompon - a municipality in Western Leyte along a strip of lush coastline in the province.
The South African team was dispatched last week and has spent the weekend in the country’s capital Manila, collecting supplies and working out the logistics of their large-scale operation.
It will be one of the first teams to set foot in the countryside of subsistence fishermen and farmers, which was inaccessible until two days ago.
The 32 rescuers, divers, doctors, paramedics and pilots in the team do not know what they will find. The first days could be spent pulling bodies from underneath layers of mud, doling out food and water or delivering vital medication to people in some of the most devastated areas.
They were set to travel by ferry, a six-hour barge trip over the flat waters that divide Cebu City, where they were stationed on Monday, and Western Leyte.
Air travel to the area has been put on hold. The local airfield, in Ormoc, has not yet restored electricity - meaning planes that land there will not be able to get back out.
As a result, planes, flown in by nations including the US, Australia and Sweden to provide relief in Ormoc, were left stranded at the airbase in Cebu City on Monday.
Cebu City has become the focal point of relief efforts in Leyte, with many victims of the typhoon fleeing Leyte making their way to the large seaside city, while relief teams use the airbase as makeshift headquarters.
As rescuers loaded crates of supplies onto planes at the city’s airbase, the mission commander Butch Hong described the situation in the region where the Gift of the Givers set up camp on Tuesday.
“Around 80 000 to 100 000 people have been affected. There is no water, no electricity. Hospitals and school buildings have been damaged and have nobody to run them.”
He called the area a “blank spot”.
He said the Gift of the Givers team would help restore order by relieving strained doctors and nurses in manning the overflowing clinics and hospitals.
“They will see to many people with trauma, pneumonia and exposure,” he said.
There is no time limit on the organisation’s mission in the region, and they may be there for over a month depending on the extent of the devastation.
On Monday, typhoon victims from Ormoc and the more central Tacloban were still arriving in droves at Cebu City’s airbase.
Tacloban was hit by surges from the storm which flattened homes in the coastal city.
On Monday, the death toll was at 4 000 - but this figure is expected to rise as relief teams continue to scour the area.
The National Department of Social Welfare has set up a receiving centre at the airfield where victims are treated, clothed and fed before being transferred to other centres.
They arrive on planes and boats, and around 8 000 victims have passed through the centre since it was started on November 11.
Most arrive with just the clothes on their backs, and some do not have even that luxury.
The survivors who did want to speak, told stories of starvation, sickness and looting.
Field officer Erlinda Barme has become a mother figure at the receiving centre.
“They come in very hungry, injured and very weak,” she said. “But they are also relieved to be in a safe place.”
* Legg is a guest of Gift of the Givers.
Cape Argus