Tacloban: Mobs overran a rice warehouse on the island worst hit by the Philippine typhoon, setting off a wall collapse that killed eight people and carting off thousands of sacks of the grain, while security forces on Wednesday exchanged gunfire with an armed gang.
The incidents in or close to the storm-ravaged city hosting international relief efforts add to concerns about the slow pace of aid distribution and that parts of the disaster zone are descending into chaos.
Five long days after Typhoon Haiyan wasted the eastern seaboard of the Philippines, the cogs of what promises to be a massive international aid effort are beginning to turn, but not quickly enough for the some 600,000 people displaced, many of them homeless, hungry and thirsty.
“There's a bit of a logjam to be absolutely honest getting stuff in here,” said U.N. staffer Sebastian Rhodes Stampa against the roar of a C-130 transport plane landing behind him at the airstrip in Tacloban, one of the hardest-hit cities.
