MANILA: At least 75 people have been reported killed in the strongest typhoon to hit the Philippines this year, official tallies showed Sunday, as efforts to deliver water and food to devastated islands ramped up.
More than 300,000 people fled their homes and beachfront resorts as Typhoon Rai ravaged the southern and central regions of the archipelago.
The storm knocked out communications and electricity in many areas, ripping off roofs and toppling concrete power poles.
Arthur Yap, governor of the popular tourist destination Bohol, said on his official Facebook page that mayors on the devastated island had reported 49 deaths in their towns.
That took the overall number of reported deaths to 75, according to the latest official figures.
Yap said 10 people were still missing on the island and 13 were injured after the storm smashed into the country Thursday as a super typhoon packing wind speeds of 195 kilometers (120 miles) per hour.
“Communications are still down. Only 21 mayors out of 48 have reached out to us,” Yap said, raising fears the death toll could rise in the flood-hit province.
Thousands of military, police, coast guard and fire personnel are being deployed to assist in search and rescue efforts in the worst-affected areas.
A Philippine Navy ship carrying goods and other relief would depart for Bohol on Monday, Yap said, after he earlier declared a state of calamity on the island.
There has also been widespread destruction on Siargao, Dinagat and Mindanao islands, which bore the brunt of Rai when it slammed into the Philippines.
Aerial photos shared by the military showed severe damage in the Siargao town of General Luna, where many surfers and holidaymakers had flocked ahead of Christmas, with buildings stripped of roofs and debris littering the ground.
Dinagat Governor Arlene Bag-ao said Saturday the damage to the island’s landscape was “reminiscent if not worse” than that caused by Super Typhoon Haiyan in 2013.
Haiyan, which is called Yolanda in the Philippines, was the deadliest cyclone on record in the country, leaving more than 7,300 people dead or missing.
Rai’s wind speeds eased to 150 kph as it barrelled across the country, dumping torrential rain that inundated villages, uprooting trees and shattering wooden structures.
It emerged over the South China Sea on Saturday and headed toward Vietnam.
The Philippines — ranked one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to the impacts of climate change — is hit by an average of 20 storms and typhoons every year, which typically wipe out harvests, homes and infrastructure in already impoverished areas.
Typhoon leaves 75 dead, many homes roofless in Philippines
https://arab.news/nwckj
Typhoon leaves 75 dead, many homes roofless in Philippines
- Typhoon Rai slightly weakened after blowing ashore Thursday on the country’s southeastern coast but remained deadly and destructive
SpaceX acquires xAI in record-setting deal as Musk looks to unify AI and space ambitions
- The deal is the biggest M&A transaction of all time
- Deal values xAI at $250 billion, SpaceX at $1 trillion
Elon Musk said on Monday that SpaceX has acquired his artificial-intelligence startup xAI in a record-setting deal that unifies Musk’s AI and space ambitions by combining the rocket-and-satellite company with the maker of the Grok chatbot. The deal, first reported by Reuters last week, represents one of the most ambitious tie-ups in the technology sector yet, combining a space-and-defense contractor with a fast-growing AI developer whose costs are largely driven by chips, data centers and energy. It could also bolster SpaceX’s data-center ambitions as Musk competes with rivals like Alphabet’s Google, Meta, Amazon-backed Anthropic and OpenAI in the AI sector.
The transaction values SpaceX at $1 trillion, and xAI at $250 billion, according to a person familiar with the matter.
“This marks not just the next chapter, but the next book in SpaceX and xAI’s mission: scaling to make a sentient sun to understand the Universe and extend the light of consciousness to the stars!” Musk said. The purchase of xAI sets a new record for the world’s largest M&A deal, a distinction held for more than 25 years when Vodafone bought Germany’s Mannesmann in a hostile takeover valued at $203 billion in 2000, according to data compiled by LSEG. The combined company of SpaceX and xAI is expected to price shares at about $527 each, another person familiar with the matter said. SpaceX was already the world’s most valuable privately held company, last valued at $800 billion in a recent insider share sale. XAI was last valued at $230 billion in November, according to the Wall Street Journal. The merger comes as the space company plans a blockbuster public offering this year that could value it at over $1.5 trillion, two people familiar with the matter said.
SpaceX, xAI and Musk did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The deal further consolidates Musk’s far-flung business empire and fortunes into a tighter, mutually reinforcing ecosystem – what some investors and analysts informally call the “Muskonomy” – which already includes Tesla, brain-chip maker Neuralink and tunnel firm the Boring Company. The world’s richest man has a history of merging his ventures together. Musk folded social media platform X into xAI through a share swap last year, giving the AI startup access to the platform’s data and distribution. In 2016, he used Tesla’s stock to buy his solar-energy company SolarCity.
The agreement could draw scrutiny from regulators and investors over governance, valuation and conflicts of interest given Musk’s overlapping leadership roles across multiple firms, as well as the potential movement of engineers, proprietary technology and contracts between entities.
SpaceX also holds billions of dollars in federal contracts with NASA, the Department of Defense and intelligence agencies, which all have some authority to review M&A transactions for national security and other risks.
