My family’s experiences during the worst tragedy that has ever befallen my hometown, the city of Pagadian. At around 12:11 AM of August 17, 1976, a 7.9-magnitude earthquake struck the Moro Gulf and had triggered a series of tsunamis in many parts of Mindanao including our city, claiming thousands of lives.
Around 7 in the morning, muddy water was still all over our place. My father found a wooden chest stuck in our yard; and when we opened it, it contained baby clothes. At least I had not seen a dead body in our yard.
Ever since we got back to our home, and throughout the day, our city further experienced several aftershocks which alarmed and terrified us all. With every little quake, people were frightened that another tsunami might occur.
Bodies had been recovered from many parts of the city. Good thing we had very few distant relatives in the city as both my parents come from different provinces, so we were spared from the agony of losing any relatives in the disaster. All the dead bodies were brought to the city plaza for families to identify and claim. Almost everyday we got news that an acquaintance of ours had either perished or lost a child, a sibling, a parent, or a relative. My sister’s best friend and classmate died in the tragedy. They lived in Purok Pagatpat whose festivity ended just minutes before the tremendous earthquake occurred. Their family lost six members in all including a baby.
After a few days, the wooden chest we found was claimed by a young couple who said that their baby was found dead floating in the river nearby. A classmate of mine was swept to the sea, but when the water washed to the shore again, she was able to hold on with all her might to a large rock that she wasn’t swept again when the sea receded. And she ran quickly to safety when the water ebbed away.
Since our school was destroyed, we had no class for several days. And after about a couple of weeks, our class met at the residence of our adviser. We held classes on their front yard for several weeks. Also, to make sure that we would be safe should another tsunami occur, my older sister and I would go to a distant relative’s house located on the city’s upper district before sunset and stay overnight at their place. That went on for several weeks until such time that my parents believed it safe for us to spend the night at home with our family.
According to the Office of Civil Defense, the number of people who died in Zamboanga del Sur, our province, was 1,440. There were 7,701 who were injured, and 909 were reported missing and were thought to be drowned at sea. And the number of people who were left homeless reached 49,848.
Our city had sustained the greatest number of casualties, the majority of which came from Santa Lucia, our very own district as it was the biggest and the most populous among the 11 coastal districts of the city.
But it was believed that the total death toll in all the devastated Mindanao provinces and cities reached up to 8,000 people.
The earthquake that happened in 1976 in Pagadian City was the strongest earthquake the city has ever experienced; and the five recorded tsunamis and a series of large waves triggered by the quake was considered to be the worst of its kind throughout the Philippines to date. This calamity was also included in the historic earthquakes and tsunamis all over the world.
hi melody,
i’m from a television station in manila. i was wondering where you live right now? i hope you can email me back at josephthaddeus@gmail.com 
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