H2-OMG! Wild Downpour Drowns Metro Manila in Heavy Traffic Reports!

Sudden flooding last Thursday caused some hellish traffic along some of Metro Manila’s main roads, including SLEX and several stretches of EDSA. This left a lot of motorists frustrated, hungry, and downright pissed off. Reports poured in on TrafficDito.com and through the TrafficDito iPhone app, and in just a couple of hours, the rain had crippled Metro Manila’s streets and pretty much ruined the rest of the night for a lot of its residents.

And as expected, Twitter went crazy!

Thinking that it probably won’t be the last time we’ll be experiencing this weather in the coming months (and the traffic that comes with it), we decided to take a look at the numbers to find out just how bad traffic is when it starts to flood. Surprise surprise, we found a 36% increase in EDSA-related heavy traffic reports found on TrafficDito.com vs. the same day last week. As if weekday afternoon traffic isn’t already bad enough!

5x more reports than the same time last week!

The spike in reports at around 3pm perfectly coincides with when the heavens let loose. Areas along EDSA such as the Cubao underpass, Ortigas, and Makati were submerged in water, ranging from gutter-deep conditions to knee-deep. It took a couple of more hours for the floods to subside, even after the rain had stopped. See that 2nd spike after 6PM? Insane traffic isn’t something anyone wants to see after a long day at work.

So it seems that we’re far from ready for the rainy season. Then again, when have we ever been really ready? Just ask Chris Lao. If there’s any takeaway his experience can give us, it’s the importance of preparedness and being informed.

Until such time that we can truly say that the problem’s solved, it’d be best to be prepared. Keep something edible (and sealed!) in your car, and maybe a bottle of water as well. If you do get stuck in traffic with the rain pouring down like crazy outside, at least you won’t be hungry (something that a lot of people seemed to be complaining about through Twitter last Thursday). Oh, and that extra 5-minute bathroom break you tell yourself you probably won’t need? JUST DO IT.

Make sure your car’s well-maintained and fit for driving through some harsh downpours. Of course, avoid driving across flooded streets as much as possible, but if you must, check out our 5 must-knows for driving through floods.

Were you one of the people who found themselves stuck along EDSA last Thursday? We’d love to get a firsthand account of how it was!

Fingers crossed for this rainy season!

-EJ, Product Marketing Padawan

Download the TrafficDito iPhone App!