Super Typhoon Haiyan hits Philippines

The strongest typhoon in the world this year has battered the Philippines, forcing more than one million people to flee.

Houses have been blown apart and power lines cut by Haiyan, a category-5 super typhoon, which could possibly be the most powerful ever to hit land.

It scoured the northern tip of Cebu Province and headed west towards Boracay island, two tourist destinations, after lashing the central islands of Leyte and Samar with 275km/h wind gusts and five to six-metre waves.

Three people were killed and seven injured, national disaster agency spokesman Rey Balido told a news briefing at the main army base in Manila.

The death toll could rise as reports come in from stricken areas.

Power and communications in the three large island provinces of Samar, Leyte and Bohol were almost completely down.

Authorities warned that more than 12 million people were at risk.

Residents of Cebu City, with a population of about 2.5 million, is among the areas at risk as well as areas still reeling from a deadly 2011 storm and a 7.2-magnitude earthquake last month.

About a million people took shelter in 29 provinces, after President Benigno Aquino appealed to people in Haiyan's path to leave vulnerable areas, such as along river banks, coastal villages and mountain slopes.

Typhoons and cyclones of this magnitude can blow apart storm shelters with the pressure they create, which can suck walls out and blow roofs off buildings.

"Power is off all across the island and the streets are deserted," said Lionel Dosdosa, an International Organisation for Migration coordinator on Bohol island.

Governor of Southern Leyte province Roger Mercado said: "Roads are still impassable. There are some landslides."

More than 100 coastal homes were flattened, while landslides destroyed houses in the hills, but he said his province had seen no casualties yet.

In Samar province, links with some towns and villages had been cut, officials said.

"The whole province has no power," Samar Governor Sharee Tan told Reuters by telephone.

Fallen trees, toppled electric poles and other debris blocked roads, she said.

Authorities suspended ferry services and fishing and shut 13 airports.

Nearly 450 domestic and eight international flights were suspended.

Schools, offices and shops in the central regions were shut, with hospitals, soldiers and emergency workers preparing rescue efforts.

Twenty navy ships and military aircraft, including three C-130 cargo planes and helicopters, are on standby.

The state weather bureau said Haiyan was expected to move past the Philippines tomorrow and out over the South China Sea, where it could strengthen even further and hit Vietnam.

Evacuations have already begun there.

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