Mangkhut claims two lives as it heads towards Hong Kong

Super Typhoon Mangkhut, the biggest storm of the year, smashed through The Philippines on Saturday, claiming its first victims when two women were killed after a rain-drench hillside collapsed on them and another drowned in Taiwan.

The storm made landfall on the northern Philippine’s island around 2.30am this morning.

The massive storm cut a swathe of destruction when it struck the northern tip of Luzon island, threatening the lives and homes of roughly four million people.

“As we go forward, this number will go higher,” Ricardo Jalad, head of the national civil defence office, told reporters, referring to the death toll.

As the powerful storm left the Southeast Asian archipelago and barrelled towards densely populated Hong Kong and southern China, search teams in the Philippines began surveying the provinces that suffered a direct hit.

Read the latest on tropical storm Mangkhut HERE.