We’ve been flooded three times since moving to the Philippines

I moved with my wife to the island of Luzon in the Philippines in mid-2009. It was a baptism of fire. Shortly after our arrival a severe tropical storm lashed our area, causing much destruction and 789 fatalities.

Where we live, a nearby river burst its banks as a result of torrents of water descending from the mountains to our east. The deluge was made worse as water was released from dams upstream to prevent them overflowing.

The sea, just 100 metres west, was at high tide during the peak of the storm. All properties within the vicinity of the river, including our apartment, were badly flooded for the first time since they were built in 2000.

The most costly damage was that to vehicles parked outside. Some were a write-off because water damaged the engines. Nobody thought to move them, because flooding was never a problem before. When a big storm is imminent now, cars are first to be moved.

We have been flooded three times in six years since moving to the Philippines. We were flooded again this year, but the water level remained low, below the power points in the house which can take up to a week to dry.

Each time the floods come, we have to move all valuable items upstairs. Our fridge has survived three times floating on top of water, and luckily still works like new.

We are both senior citizens though, so we won’t be able to cope with floods indefinitely. Eventually we will have to move. But we keep putting that day off, because we live in a conveniently located modern two-storey apartment, with very reasonable rent, equivalent to just €170 per month.

A wall was built recently to prevent the nearby river from flooding, but it failed its very first test; the water simply went round it because it wasn’t long enough.

Tropical storms originate over tropical or sub-tropical waters, which explains why storms here invariably come from the east, from the Pacific Ocean. The eastern coast gets battered as a result, and this explains why the eastern coast of Luzon island (we live on the west side) is sparsely populated - an example of climate affecting settlement patterns.

The floods, certainly in our area, are getting worse, often occurring in regions which were previously flood free.

The flooding can be due to local rather than global warming factors. For example, floods occur when rice fields, which absorb a lot of water, are replaced by housing developments, and suddenly water has nowhere to go.

The ever-expanding capital, Manila, is flooding more frequently too as ground water extraction is causing the city to sink. It lacks a proper drainage system, which is compounded by many informal settlers living along the canals and waterways, and clogging them with rubbish.

We have lived in the tropics for much of our lives, in Northern Australia, Papua New Guinea and now the Philippines. There are few countries left, even in the developed world, where the prospect of severe flooding is not a worry.