Typhoon Sinlaku lashed Taiwan yesterday with powerful winds and heavy rains, disrupting flights and train services and cutting electricity supply to almost 50,000 households.
The Central Weather Bureau said that although the storm’s eyewall — the ring of towering thunderstorms surrounding the eye where the most severe weather occurs — could be damaged after hitting land, Sinlaku would maintain its structure and remain a serious threat.
The slow-moving typhoon, with a 250km radius, is not expected to completely leave Taiwan until Tuesday and will have the greatest impact sometime before this afternoon, said Fred Tsai (蔡甫甸), a senior forecaster at the bureau.
SOURCE: CENTRAL WEATHER BUREAU
During that period, rainfall in the northern, northeastern, eastern, central and southern parts of Taiwan could reach the “extremely heavy rain” or “torrential rain” categories, defined respectively as rainfall exceeding 130mm and 200mm over a 24-hour period, he said.
The mountainous areas in these regions could even see “extremely torrential rain,” which refers to rainfall exceeding 350mm in 24 hours, Tsai said, warning people across the country — particularly those in coastal and mountainous regions — to take precautions against flooding and mudslides.
The bureau said that from Friday until 4pm yesterday, accumulations had reached 591mm at Taipingshan (太平山) in Ilan County, 552mm at Lalashan (拉拉山) in Taoyuan County, 545mm in the Tonghou (桶後) area in Taipei County and 506mm at Siciousihshan (西丘斯山) in Hsinchu County.
PHOTO: CHANG CHUNG-YI, TAIPEI TIMES
Tsai said the eye of the storm was likely to skirt the nation’s northeastern coast early today, resulting in a brief period of calm weather.
At 9:15 pm last night, Sinlaku was 70km east-southeast of Ilan, moving west-northwesterly at 6kph, packing maximum sustained winds of 173kph toward the eastern coast.
A 21-year-old man was reported injured in Taoyuan County after being hit by a collapsed fence while riding his motorcycle on Friday night.
Of the 86,108 households that lost electricity from the typhoon, power was restored in all but some 6,000 as of 5:30 pm yesterday, the Central Emergency Operation Center said.
The center said 249 groups of hikers had returned from mountains they were climbing before the typhoon arrived, while seven groups, with a total of 28 people, sought shelter in the mountains after hearing of the storm.
Most rail services and domestic flights were cancelled and all international flights departing from Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport were suspended for seven hours from 14:30pm yesterday. Thousands of fishing boats were also sheltering in ports.
In response to the severe weather conditions, the Taiwan Railway Administration suspended all regular train services before midnight last night, while commuter trains ran as weather permitted. The Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp provided only limited service. All ferry services connecting Taiwan proper to Matsu, Ludao (綠島), Lanyu (蘭嶼), Little Liouciou (小琉球) and Penghu County were canceled.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY LOA IOK-SIN
An Emirates flight from Dubai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport yesterday afternoon, the first service of the airline since the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Saturday. Flight EK366 took off from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at 3:51am yesterday and landed at 4:02pm before taxiing to the airport’s D6 gate at Terminal 2 at 4:08pm, data from the airport and FlightAware, a global flight tracking site, showed. Of the 501 passengers on the flight, 275 were Taiwanese, including 96 group tour travelers, the data showed. Tourism Administration Deputy Director-General Huang He-ting (黃荷婷) greeted Taiwanese passengers at the airport and
POSSIBILITIES EMERGE: With Taiwan’s victory and Japan’s narrow win over Australia, Taiwan now have a chance to advance if South Korea also beat the Aussies Taiwan has high hopes that the national baseball team would advance to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarter-finals after clinching a crucial 5-4 victory over South Korea in a nail-biting extra-inning game at the Tokyo Dome yesterday. Boosted by three home runs — two solo shots by Yu Chang (張育成) and Cheng Tsung-che (鄭宗哲) and a two-run homer by Stuart Fairchild — the triumph gave Taiwan a much-needed second victory in the five-team Pool C, where only the top two finishers would advance to the knockout stage in Miami, Florida. Entering extra innings with the game tied at four apiece, Taiwan scored
MISSION OF PEACE: The foreign minister urged Beijing to respect Taiwan’s existence as an independent nation, and work together to ensure peace and stability in the region Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) yesterday rejected Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi’s (王毅) comments about Taiwan, criticizing China as a “troublemaker” in the international community and a disruptor of cross-strait peace. Speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the Chinese National People’s Congress, Wang said that Taiwan has always been a territory of China and that it would be impossible for it to become its own country. The “return” of Taiwan to China was the natural outcome of the Chinese people’s resistance against Japan in World War II, and that any pursuit of independence was “doomed
One person was killed and another seven injured today when a tourist shuttle bus plunged 30m to 40m down a ravine in Nantou County, the Tourism Administration said. The bus is suspected to have suddenly accelerated out of control near the flower center of the Sun-Link-Sea Forest Recreation Area, a popular attraction during cherry blossom season. Of the eight onboard, a 66-year-old man was killed, four were seriously injured and three sustained minor injuries, including the driver. The Nantou County Police Department said it received a report of the incident at 12:15pm and dispatched seven teams to assist. All surviving passengers have been transferred
RSS