Strong winds and heavy rain brought by Super Typhoon Jangmi disrupted the nation’s transportation system, causing traffic accidents on a national freeway and damaging roads nationwide.
A Central News Agency report said yesterday that a tour bus carrying 43 Buddhists flipped over on National Freeway No. 5 after being buffeted by strong winds, injuring several passengers.
The Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp yesterday interrupted all train services from 3pm until 12pm today.
It will make an announcement at 10am on resumption of service.
For its part, the Taiwan Railway Administration canceled all express trains between 12pm and 12am yesterday, but provided commuter trains to transport passengers when needed.
Because of the strong winds, the Taipei MRT’s Muzha Line canceled its service from 5pm yesterday.
Hundreds of fishing boats were sheltered at ports while many international and domestic flights were canceled.
Meanwhile, the Directorate General of Highways reported that 14 sections of road on the provincial highways had been damaged.
Residents living in the mountainous areas of Jiuzhuang Street in Nankang (南港), Taipei City, were evacuated to nearby Nankang Elementary School yesterday amid fears of flooding.
EVACUATIONS
CTI-TV showed villagers, clutching small bags of personal belongings, evacuating the scenic mountain resort of Lushan (廬山) in central Taiwan. The area was badly damaged after Typhoon Sinlaku hit two weeks ago, with massive mudslides destroying at least three hotels.
Daniel Wu (吳德榮), director of the Central Weather Bureau’s forecast center, said the center of Jangmi made landfall at Nanao (南澳), Ilan County, at 3:40pm.
At 5:30pm, Jangmi had weakened from a super typhoon to a typhoon, the bureau said.
The center of the storm is expected to leave the coast of Tamsui (淡水) at about 5am today, it said.
At 8:30pm yesterday, the bureau reported that the center of the typhoon was located 20km north of Hualien County. It was moving northwestward at 12kph. The radius of the storm was more than 280km.
Wu warned that northern, northeastern and eastern regions would still be covered by the storm this morning. Those areas would not be out of the storm until sometime this afternoon, he said.
The storm could leave central and southern regions by this afternoon, Wu said, adding that because of the circumfluence of the storm, heavy rain would continue in these regions.
RAIN
The highest rain accumulations yesterday were registered at Taipingshan (太平山) in Ilan County, with 985mm at press time.
It was followed by Nankang in Taipei City and Fushan (福山), Taipei County, with 634mm and 486mm respectively.
The strongest winds yesterday were reported in Suao (蘇澳), Ilan County, where the bureau recorded a gust of 224.6kph, equivalent to Level 17 on the Beaufort scale.
Wind speeds reached Level 15 in Ilan and Lanyu (蘭嶼), Level 13 in Taipei, Hualien and Wuchi (梧棲) in Taichung County, and Level 12 in Keelung.
Hualien and Kinmen counties declared today working and school days as usual, while Kaohsiung, Pingtung, Taitung counties and Kaohsiung City said that schools would be closed but that government offices would be open. All remaining cities and counties have declared today a typhoon day.
Because of the typhoon, many events have been canceled. Cloud Gate Dance Theatre (雲門舞集), which originally had planned to simulcast a performance of Moon Water live on giant screens set up in the plaza between the National Theater and Concert Hall tomorrow night has canceled the simulcast.
RSS