Posted 2009/10/31 at 2:39 am EDT
MANILA, Oct. 31, 2009 (Reuters) — The third typhoon to hit the Philippines in five weeks slammed into the main island of Luzon on Saturday, uprooting trees and toppling power lines, but there were no immediate reports of widespread damage.
Authorities canceled about 180 flights from Manila while some ferry and bus services remained grounded, leaving thousands stranded and stopping people from returning to their home provinces for the All Saints' Day weekend.
Two typhoons killed more than 900 people in recent weeks, with parts of the capital, Manila, still under water.
Typhoon Mirinae weakened as it cut through coconut-growing provinces south of the capital, the weather bureau said.
"It looks like our countrymen can still commemorate All Saints' Day because the weather has cleared a bit," Colonel Ernesto Torres, spokesman of the disaster agency, said in a radio interview. "The typhoon is on its way out of the country."
The rainfall was not as heavy as had been feared, especially along the densely populated west coast of Luzon where floods from Typhoon Ketsana late last month killed more than 400 people.
Leonardo Espina, spokesman for the national police, said emergency teams had started clearing roads of uprooted trees and debris, adding some areas in and around Manila were without electricity.
Radio reports, quoting local and disaster officials, said a man died while crossing a creek in Rizal province east of the capital and another drowned when his shanty home was washed away in Manila.
(Reporting by Manny Mogato; Editing by Rosemarie Francisco)
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