Yolanda heroine inspires daughter

MANILA, Philippines - When Super Typhoon Yolanda pounded Tacloban on Nov. 8 last year, Salvacion Avestruz and three other state weather forecasters refused to abandon their posts at the city station.

As a storm surge with waves seven meters high roared into the city, Salvacion tried to save a weather instrument. A crashing wave swept her away.

Salvacion, 42, is among the missing in Tacloban. Her presumed death has not discouraged her daughter Mary Joyce, 19, from pursuing a similar career.

Mario Peñaranda, chief of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration
(PAGASA) station in Tacloban, yesterday said Salvacion tried to save the bureau’s microbarograph even though a huge wave was about to engulf the station.

Salvacion’s husband and three children have accepted monetary assistance from the weather bureau and the union amounting to P100,000.

The Civil Service Commission has also honored her along with three other civil servants.

Their families received a plaque and P100,000 each under the commission’s Pamanang Lingkod Bayani program. Three immediate family members also received partial scholarships under the project.

Working student

Mary Joyce is now working at the PAGASA station in Catarman, Northern Samar under a job order contracting scheme.

While she was supposed to do mostly clerical work, Mary Joyce said she also wants to have the opportunity to do weather observation like her mother.

She is a graduating BS math student at the University of Eastern Philippines in Catarman.

“I have to work while studying so I can support my family,” Mary Joyce told The STAR in a phone interview.

She said her mother wanted her to become a teacher.

“My nanay (mother)’s dream for me is to become a teacher,” she said, adding that she accepted the job for practical reasons.

Having been raised in an environment of weather forecasting, Mary Joyce said she wants to follow the footsteps of her mother.

She described her mother as very kind and devoted to her job.

She said her mother decided to travel to Tacloban from their house in Catarman on Nov. 8, 2013, even if it was her day off.

“I just choose not to think of her so I will not be sad,” she said when asked how she copes with their loss.

PAGASA administrator Vicente Malano told The STAR that Mary Joyce would be prioritized for hiring upon graduation.

Survivor’s tale

Meanwhile, Peñaranda continues to bear the trauma brought by Yolanda.

“There are times when the trauma comes back especially when I am alone. I still recall the horror caused by the typhoon,” Peñaranda told The STAR in a phone interview.

Yolanda – the strongest typhoon to hit the country last year – left nearly 6,000 people dead and more than 1,700 missing.

Peñaranda was with Salvacion and two other colleagues at the PAGASA station in Tacloban when storm surges as high as seven meters hit the area.

“It is the general rule in PAGASA that personnel on duty should not leave or abandon their posts at all costs if a locality is under threat from a tropical cyclone,” he said.

PAGASA has yet to rebuild its station in Tacloban as the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) still has to designate a new location for the weather bureau’s office, according to Peñaranda.

“We requested the administrations of PAGASA and CAAP if they can make our new office at least two-story so it would not be reached by high waves,” he said.

The weather bureau currently uses an office space inside the Department of Science and Technology compound in Palo, Leyte.