In July 2025 the southwest monsoon, enhanced by passing storms, flooded northern Luzon with no landfalling super typhoon needed. Why the habagat is its own hazard.
A common mistake is to think flooding only comes with a big landfalling typhoon. The 2025 monsoon floods are a clear counterexample.
In July 2025, the habagat (southwest monsoon) was enhanced by passing tropical storms, Wipha and Co-may among them, and dropped heavy rain over the northern Philippines. Roads across Luzon flooded, including stretches of the North Luzon Expressway. Reporting put the death toll for that monsoon episode at around 30, with millions affected and thousands of homes damaged. More storms followed later in 2025, and the year's overall toll from typhoons and their flooding ran into the hundreds.
The habagat is the rainy-season monsoon wind that carries moist air over the country from roughly June to September. On its own it brings rain. When a typhoon passes nearby, even without making landfall, it can pull in and intensify that monsoon rain, the same mechanism behind the 2024 Carina floods.
So a property can flood badly in a year when no typhoon ever crosses it directly. What matters is not whether a storm scores a direct hit, but whether your ground is low and near water when the rain comes. That is why our flood return periods explainer talks about odds, not schedules.
Do not judge a property's flood risk by whether "the big one" hit it. Judge it by its terrain and its flood-zone status, which decide what happens every rainy season, habagat included.
CheckHazard does not replace a professional geotechnical or engineering survey. Figures reflect public reporting.