By Caitlin Stuckwish and Josh Allenberg

At 4:30 a.m. local time November 8th, Typhoon Haiyan swept through the Philippines. The storm sustained winds of 195 mph, gusting to 235 mph, making it stronger than a Category 5 hurricane. Reports from USA Today suggest that Haiyan is one of the most powerful storms ever recorded. According to the Weather Channel, Haiyan made landfall at 3.5 times the strength of Hurricane Katrina, which caused $108 billion in damage.

In the city of Tacloban, Juvelyn Taniega, a mother of six, discovered the bodies of three of her children, along with her husband’s body, but the bodies of three of her children are still missing. She told CNN’s Anderson Cooper that she “really want[s] to see them, even if it’s just their bodies.”

Another Tacloban resident spoke out about the loss of his wife and child. He described the damage to CNN.

“The first one that I saw was my youngest,” he said. “She fainted, and then she drowned. The water was so fast. And then my wife, when I tried to grab her, I missed her. Then she drowned, and then I never saw her again.”

The relief effort was greatly aided by the arrival of Carrier Strike Group Five, a U.S. Navy carrier strike group, with the flagship U.S.S. George Washington, an aircraft carrier that has a crew of 5,500 sailors. In the Washington’s battle group are also eight other ships. The battle group is home to 80 aircraft, and 21 helicopters that are being used to deliver supplies and conduct search-and-rescue operations in hard-to-reach areas.

On Wednesday, November 13th, Carlow held “A Cup of Tea Day,” with the proceeds initially to go to the Mercy International Centre, the first house of Mercy built by Catherine McAuley in Dublin, Ireland. In light of the devastation in Tacloban, which contains facilities of the Religious Sisters of Mercy that were damaged, the Mercy International Centre requested that all funds raised be diverted to the needs of the sisters in the Philippines.