Make San Roque Dam pay

THE 10/9 deluge was irrefutably caused by the combination of a totally unexpected natural occurrence over which man had no control, and by a totally unexpected error in judgment that could have been clearly avoided.

When Typhoon Pepeng lingered for days and hovered over extreme northern Luzon, the indicators for a natural disaster arising from a natural calamity were already present. As early as October 3, deaths, flooding and landslides were already reported over a larger swathe of Northern Luzon.

As early as October 4, an impending disaster in Pangasinan loomed when a dike in San Nicolas town was reportedly in danger of totally eroding due to a huge volume of water flowing in Ambayaoan River. The National Disaster Coordinating Council had warned that a break in the dike would result in massive flooding in Eastern Pangasinan.

All these information had alerted the provincial government and correctly acted to launch preemptive measures. What the Capitol was not prepared for was the incompetence and brinksmanship style of management of the San Roque Dam by supposedly experts. No provincial government could   have been prepared at anytime for the opening of six spillway gates by 26 meters to dump 5,361 cubic meters of water per second on six spillways at a time when rivers in the province have began to swell from the non-stop rains of Pepeng.

The questions that bear asking of the management of the San Roque Dam are: What were they thinking when reports of flooding in Northern Luzon were known? Why did they have to wait for the water elevation to reach 289.1 meters before it decided to dump the excess water down on everyone like it was all a mere technical issue? Could it have not measured the amount of rainfall of the past 2 days and calculated to slowly release the same volume that had been collected?

Last week was not the first time that the management of the San Roque Dam caused millions of destruction to lives and properties in the province. Last week was simply the worst and we think that because the officials simply got away with slaps on the wrist in the past, they dared to gamble with nature if only to gauge maximum capacity of the dam with no regard to fate of thousands who live around it. It would appear that a mere press release explaining what they did would exculpate them from any responsibility.

Its time the San Roque Power Corporation and its officials be made to account and pay for the damages caused Pangasinan. An investigation is imperative and heads must be made to roll this time, not next time.  They must pay for ignoring the fatal equation for disaster in the province: Continuous rain plus Huge water releases equals Destruction.

Back to Homepage

Share your Comments or Reactions

comments

Powered by Facebook Comments