The second typhoon to hit the Philippines in two weeks made landfall Saturday, forcing the evacuation of thousands in an eastern province where hundreds died in the last storm.Typhoon Utor, packing sustained winds of 75 mph, made landfall in Guiuan, a town in the Eastern Samar province - about 400 miles southeast of Manila - at noon Saturday. It was expected to cross the central Visayas region and be over the South China Sea by Monday, chief weather forecaster Nathaniel Cruz said.
The new typhoon's path is just south of the region where Typhoon Durian left more than 1,000 people dead or missing last week.
Fernando Gonzales, governor of hard-hit Albay province, said Saturday about 15,000 people from about a dozen villages, including those wiped out by mudslides caused by Durian, were ordered evacuated to temporary shelters in government buildings, schools and churches.
Those numbers are in addition to the more than 100,000 people already in evacuation centers following Durian, the National Disaster Coordinating Council in Manila said.
That typhoon unleashed tons of rocks and other volcanic debris from the slopes of the Mayon volcano, sending walls of mud and boulders onto villages below.
The latest typhoon prompted the postponement of next week's Southeast Asian and East Asian summits in central Cebu city and nearby Mactan island.