Fallen trees litter the ground at the Tacloban airport in the Philippines in the aftermath of Super Typhoon Haiyan on Saturday, November 9. The most powerful cyclone in three decades battered the Philippines, killing a number of people and leaving more than 100 bodies scattered on the streets of this coastal city. Haiyan, one of the most intense typhoons on record, plowed across the country on Friday, with monster winds tearing roofs off buildings and giant waves washing away homes. 
People carry a victim of the super typhoon in the devastated city of Tacloban, population 220,000. Most of the other badly hit cities and islands were cut off, making the number of casualties unclear.Haiyan hit with 3.5 times the force of Hurricane Katrina. 
Vietnamese Red Cross staff members place sandbags on the roof of a house as they prepare for the arrival of Haiyan in the central provincial coastal city of Danang. Vietnam has started evacuating more than 100,000 people from the path of the super typhoon. 
The dead lay in floodwaters after the super typhoon devastated the city of Tacloban. On Saturday, Philippine troops began to retrieve bodies strewn in areas devastated by the typhoon. 
Devastation is everywhere in Iloilo in the central Philippines in the aftermath of the typhoon. 
People seek shelter with their belongings after the powerful typhoon in Tacloban. 
Residents return to their houses after leaving an evacuation site in Tacloban. 
A boy walks past the devastation brought about by Haiyan at Tacloban. Roofs and windows were blown off and out of many of the buildings left standing. 
A vehicle lies amidst debris in Tacloban. 
People walk past a victim left on the side of a road in Tacloban. 
An airport lies in ruins in the city of Tacloban in the Philippines. 
A wounded man walks the tattered streets of the city of Tacloban. 
A man walks among the debris of destroyed houses in the aftermath of the super typhoon in Tacloban. 
Astronaut Karen L. Nyberg took a picture of the super typhoon from the International Space Station. Haiyan first landed near the cities of Dulag and Tacloban, flooding coastal communities with a surge of water and delivering 195-mph winds with gusts reaching as high as 235 mph. 
Women walk past fallen trees and destroyed houses in Tacloban. Residents scoured supermarkets for water and food as they slowly emerged on streets littered with debris. 
People wait in line for relief goods such as ready-to-eat meals, clothing, blankets, medicine and water in the city of Tacloban. Mobile services were down, and officials were relying on intermittent communication using radios. 
A soldier pulls a cable inside the devastated airport tower in Tacloban. 
Houses are destroyed by the strong winds caused by the typhoon in Tacloban. 
People stand on a pier Friday, November 8, as the super typhoon smashes into coastal communities on the central Philippine island of Bacolod. 
Dark clouds brought by Super Typhoon Haiyan loom over the skyscrapers of Manila, Philippines, on November 8. 
A woman carries a baby across a river November 8 at a coastal village in Las Pinas, Philippines. 
A resident walks along a fishing village in Bacoor, Philippines, on November 8. 
A house in Legazpi, Philippines, is engulfed by storm surge November 8. 
A child wraps himself in a blanket November 8 inside a makeshift house along a Bacoor fishing village. 
A woman and her children head for an evacuation center November 8 amid strong winds in Cebu City, Philippines. 
Huge waves from Haiyan hit the shoreline in Legazpi on November 8. 
A fisherman lifts a post to reinforce his home at a coastal village in Las Pinas on November 8. 
A resident unloads nets off a fishing boat in Bacoor on November 8. 
Residents clear a road November 8 after a tree was toppled by strong winds in the Philippine island province of Cebu. 
A fisherman secures his wooden boat November 8 as Haiyan's strong winds hit Legazpi. 
Residents reinforce their homes in Las Pinas on November 8. 
Legazpi residents are relocated to an evacuation center on Thursday, November 7. About 125,000 people took refuge in evacuation centers, and hundreds of flights were canceled. 
The storm approaches the Philippines in this satellite image taken November 7 by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. With sustained winds of 315 kph (195 mph) and gusts as strong as 380 kph (235 mph), Haiyan's wind strength makes it equivalent to an exceptionally strong Category 5 hurricane. 
Workers bring down a billboard in Makati, Philippines, on November 7 before Haiyan makes landfall. 
In anticipation of the storm, fishermen carry a boat out of the water in Ormoc, Philippines, on November 7. 
Philippine Coast Guard personnel stand in formation beside newly acquired rubber boats after a blessing ceremony in Manila on Wednesday, November 6. The boats were to be deployed to the central Philippines in preparation for Haiyan. 
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- No building in the city of 200,000 appeared to have survived intact
- All communications except for satellite phones were down
- A couple loses three of their daughters
- Red Cross may charter a boat to reach area
Tacloban, Philippines (CNN) -- The destruction here is staggering: No building in this coastal city of 200,000 residents appeared Saturday to have escaped damage when Super Typhoon Haiyan roared through on Friday.
Roads were impassable; all communications except for satellite phones were down; medical supplies, food and water were scarce; and there were reports of looting.
The costs -- in human lives, buildings and infrastructure -- were impossible to estimate with confidence as bodies washed up on beaches and littered the streets.
The nation's interior minister said only that they would be high.
Death toll likely exceeds 1,000
Utter devastation in Tacloban 
Super typhoon death toll rises 
People unable to reach loved ones 
Water levels reached the second story The million people who lived along the coast, many of them in rough-built shacks, may have been worst affected by what some said was a 5-foot storm surge that spread through the city at the height of the storm and with devastating speed.
It receded quickly, leaving a path marked by pieces of people's lives destroyed.
One woman said she lost three of her daughters -- ages 8, 13 and 15 -- in seconds as the storm surge tore them from her husband's arms. The couple had found the bodies of the two youngest.
"Only one is missing," the father said, his face contorting with grief. "I hope she's alive."
The city airport was not ready to accommodate the landing of planes carrying aid, though military helicopters began ferrying in supplies on Saturday.
Residents lined up at the airport for food. But the resources available were proving no match for the massive needs of the people, some of whom scoured piles of garbage in the streets for food, water or even missing loved ones.
Gwendolyn Pang, secretary general of the Philippine Red Cross, estimated that 1,000 people died here.
"Probably the casualty figure will increase as we get more information from remote areas, which have been cut off from communications," said Tomoo Hozumi, UNICEF's Philippines representative.
Tacloban suffered the greatest devastation, said Lt. Jim Aris Alago, information officer for Navy Central Command. "There are numbers of undetermined casualties found along the roads.
"We expect the greatest number of casualties there," Alago said.
People were wading through waist-high water amid a landscape littered with overturned vehicles, downed utility poles and trees, all of which were blocking the aid effort.
The Philippine Red Cross succeeded in getting its assessment team in to Tacloban but had not managed to get its main team of aid workers and equipment to the city, Chairman Richard Gordon said.
"We really are having access problems," he said, adding that he was considering chartering a boat, which would take at least 1½ days to get there.
Tacloban is the largest city in the Eastern Visayas Islands. It was an important logistical base during World War II and served as a temporary capital of the Philippines.
CNN's Andrew Stevens and Paula Hancocks reported this story from Tacloban; Tom Watkins wrote from Atlanta
