(09-28) 18:49 PDT -- With their homes and offices flooded, landlines overloaded and electricity knocked out, residents of the typhoon-stricken regions of the Philippines managed to report news of their plight to the world by using cell phones and social networks.

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Videos of residents trapped in flooded homes or atop floating cars in the wake of the deadly Tropical Storm Ketsana, called Ondoy in the Philippines, were posted on YouTube. Those clips were then reposted on Facebook, along with photos of the devastation.

Meanwhile, Twitter streams reported on the need for food or medicine. Many tweets were pleas for information about missing loved ones.

It's the latest example of the growing role of social media as a source for breaking news, an outlet for citizen journalism and a platform to get the community involved in relief efforts.

Hundreds killed

The storm hit the northern Philippines as a typhoon on Saturday, dumping more than a month's worth of rain in just 12 hours and causing the worst flooding to hit the nation in 40 years. At least 240 people have been killed and thousands are now homeless.

"I think a lot of people are getting the news basically through postings on Facebook," said Rene Astudillo, executive director at Lupus Foundation of Northern California.

Astudillo, former executive director of the Asian American Journalists Association, was worried when he couldn't reach his brother in the Philippines because landlines were not working.

Astudillo finally reached him with a text message just as his brother was being evacuated from the rising waters. Meanwhile, he kept monitoring news reports and YouTube videos for the latest information and posted frequently what he found on Facebook for others to see.

"Getting the kind of direct reports, photos and video from the man on the street in the Philippines or elsewhere (is) a good way for people to know what's happening," Astudillo said. "It's also a good way for the media to monitor what's happening."

Indeed, television news outlets such as Atlanta's CNN and the ABS-CBN network in the Philippines have aired videos originally posted on YouTube.

Meanwhile, Facebook and Twitter users are asking their communities to repost requests to help find a missing relative or friend in the stricken areas. One fan page for Ateneo de Manila University is filled with such requests, along with news tips about topics such as crocodiles missing from a nature park and robbers trying to break into homes in a mud-covered village.

Some posts on Facebook and elsewhere complain that social networks are doing a better job covering the disaster than mainstream news outlets.

Goes viral

Keith Kamisugi, communications director of the Equal Justice Society of San Francisco, notes that social-media users also post information from standard news sources, such as the Associated Press. But social media has "become part of the viral ecology" of how news gets from mainstream sources to the public, he said.

Kamisugi set up a Facebook events page devoted to the disaster and was able to notify about 2,000 people in 10 minutes.

Keesa Ocampo, a spokeswoman for the ABS-CBN Foundation of Redwood City, a fundraising arm of the ABS-CBN TV network, said efforts such as those by Kamisugi have helped bring the disaster to the attention of "a very wide audience."

That could be crucial to recovery efforts because the country was not prepared to deal with disaster relief on such a large scale, she said.

"This tragedy is so hair-raising," Ocampo said. "The rich and poor alike were greatly affected."

ABS-CBN Foundation also started a Facebook page with a call for donations and within hours received "tens of thousands of dollars," she said. Friendster, the Mountain View social network that has gained popularity in Southeast Asia, has launched a sitewide campaign to draw attention to relief efforts.

"We've deployed similar campaigns in the past for natural disasters worldwide, especially those in our major markets," said Friendster spokesman Jeff Roberto.

E-mail Benny Evangelista at bevangelista@sfchronicle.com

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