Casualties and Damages

The 15 November 1994 earthquake affected 13 out of 15 municipalities or a total of 273 barangays in Oriental Mindoro. As per official report of the Provincial Social Welfare and Development Office (PSWDO), about 22452 families were affected. Casualties numbered 78 confirmed dead and 430 injured. The municipality of Baco sustained the biggest number of casualties, with 41 confirmed deaths from drowning due to the tsunami that hit the coastal area of Malaylay, San Andres, Baco. The capital town, Calapan, has the second most number of casualties, with 17 deaths from Wawa, also a coastal area in Calapan. Almost half of the casualties were children below 10 years old who were drowned.

Table 2 and Table 3 present a summary of damaged houses and infrastructures in the affected towns.

Some 7566 houses were damaged: 1530 totally or washed away by tsunami, and 6036 partially. The municipalities of Calapan and Baco had the biggest number of totally destroyed houses (Fig. 42 & Fig. 43). However, Naujan and Gloria had the biggest number of partially damaged houses with 2204 and 1138 houses respectively.

Damaged infrastructure include 24 bridges 8 of which were rendered impassable for days, isolating villages and towns in the interior. Roads with a combined span of 500 km likewise sustained damage. With round-the clock emergency work and fast track repairs by the Provincial Engineering Office, the Provincial Disaster Coordinating Council and the Department of Public Works and Highways, all the bridges and road connections from Puerto Galera to Bulalacao became passable to light vehicles by the end of November.

Three major power plants--two in Luzon Grid and on in Visayas--tripped during the earthquake, causing brown outs on Mindoro Island and parts of Leyte and Samar. Some areas in Metro Manila also experienced brief power interruption. In Calapan itself, the floating 7.2 megawatt power barge was swept inland by the tsunami. This ran aground 2 kilometers away from its original location. Power was partially restored in Mindoro before the end of November, but it took another month before the power situation in the province was normalized.

Total Cost of rehabilitating damaged buildings and infrastructures is placed at P5.15 Million.