MANILA (REUTERS, BLOOMBERG) - Nine people were killed and hundreds spent the night huddled on their roofs in the central Philippines as floods generated by a powerful typhoon inundated villages, disaster officials said on Wednesday (Dec 16).

Typhoon Melor had paralysed the capital Manila by late Tuesday, with floodwaters chest-deep in some areas disrupting train services and causing traffic gridlock on major roads. Five people were listed as missing.

Schools were shut in the greater Manila area and nearby cities.

The typhoon, known locally as Nona, was about 150km north-west of Mindoro island, just to the south of Manila, with winds at its centre of 130kph.

Mindoro Governor Alfonso Umali said in a radio interview that four people were killed in what he described as one of the strongest typhoons to hit the province in years.

Another five people were killed in Northern Samar, where Melor first made landfall further south. About 90 per cent of the province was affected, said disaster official Jonathan Baldo. "Many people will spend Christmas in evacuation centres without power and potable water," he said.

Thousands of lightly constructed houses had been reduced to "matchsticks", he said. "It may take three to four months to restore power in the province after power lines and electricity posts were toppled by strong winds," he added.

Five fishermen were missing in Albay gulf on the heavily populated main island of Luzon, officials there said.

About 120 domestic flights were grounded and nearly 200 ferry services were stopped.

The storm forced the evacuation of about 800,000 people to shelters. Another storm is expected to hit the southern Philippines later this week, forecaster Accuweather said.

An average of 20 typhoons pass through the Philippines each year. In 2013, typhoon Haiyan killed more than 6,300 people and left 1.4 million homeless in the central Philippines.