Tropical depression “Perla” has intensified into a severe tropical storm Saturday morning, the Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) said.
PAGASA chief Sonny Pajarilla said Perla is now located at 600 kilometers east of Basco, Batanes.
It has maximum winds of 95 kilometers per hour (kph) and gustiness reaching 115 kph. Perla is now moving west-northwest at the speed of 15kph.
“Perla is still forecast not to bring significant high-impact weather over extreme northern Luzon. However, residents and disaster managers in extreme northern Luzon are still advised to continue monitoring for updates,” Pajarilla said.
Sea travel is still risky especially for small sea vessels over the seaboards of northern Luzon due to potentially rough sea conditions associated with the northeasterly surface wind flow.
Due to the prevailing of northeasterly surface wind flow, occasional gusts may occur over extreme northern Luzon until early next week.
