General Flood Advisories in the Philippines

A General Flood Advisory is PAGASA’s simplified flood bulletin for river basins that have no automatic gauges: it is issued when significant rain has fallen or is forecast, and it names, province by province, the rivers and tributaries likely to be affected, with the rain expected in the next 12 hours. It advises the people living near mountain slopes and in the low-lying areas along those rivers, and the local disaster risk reduction and management councils, to take precautionary measures.

PAGASA, the weather service of the Philippines, warns of floods in two ways. For the major river basins with automatic gauges, its river centres issue flood bulletins against three water levels (alert, alarm and critical: 40, 60 and 100 % of a full river). For the river basins without them, it issues a General Flood Advisory whenever significant rain has been recorded or is forecast — from observations, weather models, satellites and radar — region by region through the NDRRMC, at 7:00 and 19:00.