It was the cruelest of ironies unleashed by Super Typhoon Haiyan.
One of the strongest ever
recorded, the storm put the Philippine port city of Tacloban
underwater, and storm chaser James Reynolds was there filming the
natural disaster at what's been regarded as its ground zero.
Then, when evening fell, the town caught fire.
There was water, water, everywhere -- yet nary enough to put out a fire, Reynolds said.
The surge of sea water was followed by a sea of flames.
Photos: Super Typhoon Haiyan
Interactive map of the storm
The futility -- and
absurdity -- of the moment was captured by one merchant using buckets of
water against the inferno in his shop.
It was hopeless. The merchant didn't stand a chance, said Reynolds, who's from Oxford, England.
"One block of the city
was up in flames, a raging fire was burning uncontrollably," Reynolds
said in telephone interview from the Philippines.
"I honestly felt like it
was some sort of disaster movie. It was so bad, it didn't seem real.
This struck home hard that this was a city in a desolate state," he
said.
Nothing else like this storm
Haiyan was the worst storm that Reynolds, 30, has ever chased. Since 2005, he and his Earth Uncut Productions
crew have filmed 35 typhoons -- plus a couple of major volcanic
eruptions including Mount Merapi in Indonesia in 2010. They also covered
the aftermath of the Japanese tsunami in 2011.
"It was without a doubt
the most catastrophic event I've witnessed before my eyes," Reynolds
said of the super typhoon. "To actually go through a disaster as it
takes place and then be there afterward just compares to nothing. It'll
probably be the only time in my life."
The experience wasn't without casualties to crew and gear, however.
One team member suffered a six-inch gash down to the bone of his leg, Reynolds said.
So the team managed to
get a helicopter ride to the Tacloban airport. Road travel wasn't
possible because downed trees and utility poles closed streets.
From the airport, the
Philippine military was kind enough to give the film crew a plane ride
Saturday to Cebu City, where medical care was available.
The storm also destroyed
most of Reynolds' camera gear, so he used a small backup camera and
even his iPhone to film the biblical-like flooding of Tacloban -- until
his batteries began to die.
Philippines gets more than its share of disasters
The team had no choice but to cut short its extraordinary work in Tacloban.
Reynolds and his crew
filmed the height of flooding while at a Tacloban hotel. There, guests
on the first floor had to be ferried out of danger while afloat on
mattresses, including one elderly woman escorted by good Samaritans
wading through the waist-high water.
The first-floor guests
couldn't open their doors against the rising water, so they smashed
windows to try to exit. A CNN crew assisted; its members also were
staying at the hotel.
"It was really put the
cameras down, we've got to get out there and help these people.
Otherwise possibly they could drown," Reynolds said.
The first-floor guests were taken to higher ground.
"The water was coming in
everywhere, even in the heart of the hotel," Reynolds said. "And my
camera gave up. All the batteries were drained, and there was no
electricity."
'You could feel the whole hotel ... shaking'
Reynolds chose the hotel
because it was made of concrete, was about five miles inland and had an
elevation of four stories, well above the surge of ocean that was
expected to sweep over the coastal city -- and did.
The crew got lucky: they
checked into the last available room on the fourth floor. Even if there
was no room at the inn, they would have slept in the hallway of the
fourth floor, just for the safe refuge, Reynolds said.
"During the height of
the storm, the scream of the wind was deafening. We could hear just
thunderous crashes of debris flying through the air. At some points, you
could feel the whole hotel, which was made of solid concrete, shaking,"
Reynolds said.
To film the apocalyptic
moment, the crew arrived in Tacloban on Thursday from their Hong Kong
offices. They initially checked into small waterfront hotel and then
moved to a beach resort, but they abandoned both places as they received
reports of the impending storm's ferocity.
Tacloban emerges as one of Typhoons Haiyan's most damaged targets
For all their efforts, they found the most cinematic moment in the silence after the super typhoon passed.
It was Friday night, and Reynolds was standing on his hotel's roof.
A blackout enveloped the town.
Then the sky became afire.
"You could see the city skyline illuminated by lighting. The city was up in flames. And it was surreal," Reynolds said.
For all the peril and loss, would Reynolds do it again?
"Yes!" he said.
But not for a while, he added.
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