DAZED survivors begged for help and scavenged for food, water and medicine after a super typhoon killed an estimated 10,000 in the central Philippines.

President Benigno Aquino declared a state of national calamity and deployed hundreds of soldiers in the coastal city of Tacloban to quell looting.

The huge scale of death and destruction from Friday's storm become clearer as reports emerged of thousands of people missing and images showed apocalyptic scenes in one town that has not been reached by rescue workers.

One of the most powerful storms ever recorded, typhoon Haiyan levelled Basey, a seaside town in Samar province six miles across a bay from Tacloban in Leyte province, where at least 10,000 people were killed, officials said.

About 2000 people were missing in Basey, said the governor of Samar province.

"The situation is bad, the devastation has been significant. In some cases the devastation has been total," Secretary to the Cabinet Rene Almendras said.

The UN said officials in Tacloban, which bore the brunt of the storm on Friday, had seen a mass grave of 300-500 bodies. More than 600,000 people were displaced by the storm in the country and some have no access to food, water, or medicine, the UN says.

Flattened by surging waves and monster winds up to 235 mph, Tacloban, 360 miles southeast of Manila, was relying almost entirely for supplies and evacuation on just three military transport planes flying from nearby Cebu city.

Dozens of residents clamoured for help at the airport gates.

In a nationwide broadcast, Mr Aquino said the government was focusing relief and assistance efforts on Samar and Leyte provinces, which acted as "funnels for the storm surges".

Declaration of a state of national calamity should quicken rescue, relief and rehabilitation efforts.

More bad weather was on the way with a depression due to bring rain to the central and southern Philippines yesterday, the weather bureau said.

Three days after the typhoon made landfall, residents of Tacloban told terrifying accounts of being swept away by a wall of water, revealing a city hopelessly unprepared for a storm of Haiyan's almost unprecedented power.

Most of the damage and deaths were caused by waves that inundated towns, washed ships ashore and swept away villages in scenes reminiscent of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

Jean Mae Amande, 22, said she was washed several kilometres from her home by the surge of water.

The current ripped her out to sea before pushing her back to shore where she was able to cling to a tree and grab a rope thrown from a boat.

An old man who had been swimming with her died when his neck was gashed by an iron roof, she said.

"It's a miracle that the ship was there," Ms Amande said.

Haiyan, one of the strongest typhoons ever recorded, is estimated to have destroyed about 70 to 80% of structures in its path. The damage to the coconut- and rice-growing region was expected to amount to more than three billion pesos (£43 million), Citi Research said in a report, with "massive losses" for private property.

Bodies litter the streets of Tacloban, rotting and swelling under the sun. People walked covering their noses with rags or old clothes to mask the stench.

International aid agencies said relief resources in the largely Catholic Philippines were stretched thin after a 7.2 magnitude quake in central Bohol province last month and displacement caused by a conflict with Muslim rebels in southern Zamboanga province.

Twenty-one countries pledged to send relief, including Indonesia, the US, Britain, Japan, Singapore, New Zealand and Hungary, Mr Aquino said.

The Italian bishops conference pledged €3m (£2.5m) in emergency aid, adding to $150,000 (£94,000) given by Pope Francis and €100,000 by Catholic charity Caritas. Relief operations were further hampered because roads, airports and bridges had been destroyed or were covered in wreckage.