Police deploy units to Pablo-battered areas

Police said on Tuesday that its search and rescue units and equipment were deployed to provinces in the eastern seaboard of Southern Philippines as Supertyphoon Pablo (Bopha) made landfall this morning in Baganga, Davao Oriental.

All Mindanao-based police regional offices have remained on full alert status even before typhoon warning signals were raised by the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council, the Philippine National Police added.

These units, including three police regional offices in the Visayas along the path of weather disturbance have been instructed to take precautionary measures and other disaster response operations such as forward deployment and pre-positioning of search and rescue assets.

PNP chief director general Nicanor A Bartolome directed all concerned units and offices in the affected areas to activate their respective rescue units.

"The lessons learned from our experience in the series of weather disturbances in 2009, particularly during the onslaught of Storm Ondoy, Typhoon Pepeng and Typhoon Sendong in Mindanao, should prompt us to find more better ways of ensuring readiness to effectively address similar situations," Bartolome said.

Apart from evacuation, search, rescue and relief operation, in affected areas, the PNP also mobilized its local and national investigative units to assist local government units and Department of Trade and Industry in monitoring market conditions for price control violations and unfair trade practices.