MANILA - The Philippine Navy on Thursday placed all its units in Northern Luzon on red alert in anticipation of "supertyphoon" Pepeng (international codename Parma).

Commodore Jose Luis Alano, commander of Naval Forces Northern Luzon, said he has also ordered the prepositioning of disaster relief response teams (DRRT) in possible critical areas including Cagayan, La Union, Pangasinan and Zambales.

Alano said each DRRTs are manned by an officer and 15 enlisted personnel and equipped with rubber boats, portable generators, life saving kits and M35 trucks.

The Navy regional commander said DRRTs are the command's quick response team for disasters. He said each team can be "deployed at a moment's notice."

Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, meanwhile, met with top police and local government officials from La Union and Benguet to assure their preparedness for Typhoon Pepeng, which was expected to make landfall in the Aurora-Isabela areas in Northern Luzon on Saturday afternoon.

Teodoro made sure that each police and local government units have already in place equipment in disaster-prone areas and prepared evacuation centers.

The National Disaster Coordinating Council (NDCC), which the defense chief concurrently heads, has already readied "relief goods inventory" in case residents needs to be evacuated from flood and landslide prone areas.

An ABS-CBN News report said that Teodoro has asked local government officials to convert cockpit arenas and sports coliseums into evacuation centers to be able to accommodate hundreds of thousands of displaced residents.

"We should start preparing. We only have two days," Teodoro said as the government's weather bureau predicted the typhoon to hit Northern Luzon on Saturday morning. The weather bureau is also anticipating Pepeng to strengthen into a super typhoon as it moves nearer to the region. With a report from Noel Alamar, radio dzMM