Rescue teams worked through debris in General Santos, the southern Philippine city hardest hit by a powerful earthquake, focusing on a commercial building that collapsed and is believed to shelter two people who remain trapped inside. Authorities said two people were pulled alive from the structure and a third was recovered dead, while scanning equipment has yet to detect signs of life from the remaining two.
Regional fire officer Edgar Tanawan, who is leading the operation at the collapsed building that housed a grocery store and other businesses, confirmed the partial recoveries and the continued search for the two presumed trapped individuals. Family members gathered outside the damaged building, waiting anxiously for updates from rescue personnel.
"It’s difficult to accept, as a mother, that my son is still trapped there," said Dioslinda Deluvio, 65, speaking as she waited outside the site. "I don’t know… it’s very hard to accept. My only call is to have him retrieved today so we can be at peace."
The quake measured 7.8 in magnitude and struck early on a Monday morning about 20 km off the coast of Sarangani province, officials said, triggering tsunami warnings across several countries. Tremors were strongly felt across Mindanao and as far away as Manado, located 420 km away on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.
Authorities reported at least 37 people killed and more than 400 injured, with four still listed as missing as search and rescue efforts continued. Scenes of destruction were widespread in parts of General Santos, a city of more than 700,000 residents that has been placed under a state of calamity. Multiple buildings have collapsed and streets are cluttered with debris beneath a tangle of toppled power lines and utility poles.
Philippine disaster officials have been inspecting damaged structures to determine the extent of destruction and are working to restore essential services, including electricity and water, for thousands of affected residents. Officials emphasized the importance of restoring power, especially for medical facilities that rely on electricity for specialized treatments.
Damage reached into public services as well. Schools, which had just reopened on a Monday after a long break, were ordered closed while authorities inspected school buildings; thousands sustained damage ranging from minor to severe, Rafaelito Alejandro, head of the office of civil defence, told DZBB radio. A video circulated by a school showed children sitting on a floor that swayed violently before they fled as a makeshift shelter collapsed behind them.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology recorded 23 strong aftershocks following the main quake, the largest of which measured magnitude 6.7. Those repeated tremors forced some residents to abandon damaged homes and spend the night in evacuation centres and tents.
Health officials reported hospitals and clinics treating patients in makeshift tents in General Santos and neighboring Sarangani as teams worked to confirm that medical facilities themselves were safe to use. Health Secretary Teodoro Herbosa, speaking to DZBB, said that outages were limiting access to sensitive and sophisticated treatments needed by patients and underscored the urgency of restoring power.
Philippine authorities noted that the nation experiences numerous earthquakes each year and sits on seismically active areas of the Pacific Ring of Fire. The recent event comes eight months after another deadly tremor, when a shallow 6.9-magnitude quake struck off the central island of Cebu and killed 79 people.
Search and rescue teams continue to work through the wreckage of damaged buildings, prioritizing life-saving recoveries while assessing damage and coordinating restoration of utilities. Local officials have not yet provided an assessment that would indicate whether the death toll will rise further; they said they were hoping casualties would not increase as operations progressed.
For now, the focus remains on reaching those still believed trapped, tending to the injured, and reestablishing essential services for thousands of residents displaced by the quake and its powerful aftershocks.