More moderate to strong aftershocks can be expected in eastern Taiwan over the next two weeks in the wake of a magnitude 5.4 earthquake in that area early yesterday, the Central Weather Bureau warned.
As of 11am yesterday, a total of 58 aftershocks had been recorded in Hualien County after the main earthquake that occurred at 0:15am, the bureau said.
The quake’s center was located at sea 31.5km south of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 10km, the bureau said. The tremor was felt at an intensity of 6 in the coastal area of Jici (磯崎).
The quake was followed by 58 others as of 11am yesterday, including one of magnitude 4.9 that struck at 3:30am and was centered in Shoufeng Township (壽豐).
The Hualien Fire Department said it had not received any -reports of major damage except for some blockage of mountain roads caused by falling rocks, which were all cleared before daybreak.
As the earthquake was strong and at a shallow depth, it is likely that aftershocks of magnitude 4 to 5 will continue over the next two weeks, the bureau’s seismology center director Kuo Kai-wen (郭鎧紋) said.
Kuo urged the public not to panic over the frequency of the aftershocks, saying they are just a normal release of energy.
Taiwan has been hit by a number of earthquakes this month, the strongest of which measured 6.5 on the Richter scale and was centered under the seabed off the east coast on Sunday. None of the quakes have caused casualties or major damage.
Eastern Taiwan’s location at the boundary of two tectonic plates — the Philippine Sea Plate and the Pacific Plate — makes it especially prone to earthquakes, Kuo said.
When a magnitude 7.3 earthquake struck central Taiwan on Sept. 21, 1999, about 1,000 aftershocks occurred the same day, he said.
A subsidiary of a Hong Kong-based company that has lost control of two critical ports on the Panama Canal said it is seeking US$2 billion of compensation in damages from Panama over its “illegal” takeover of the ports. Panama Ports Co, a unit of Hong Kong’s CK Hutchison Holdings (長江和記實業), on Friday said in a statement that it is demanding the sum under international arbitration proceedings that it had already started. The Panamanian government last week seized control of the Balboa and Cristobal ports on each end of the Panama Canal, after the country’s Supreme Court declared earlier that a concession allowing
DETERRENCE: With 1,000 indigenous Hsiung Feng II and III missiles and 400 Harpoon missiles, the nation would boast the highest anti-ship missile density in the world With Taiwan wrapping up mass production of Hsiung Feng II and III missiles by December and an influx of Harpoon missiles from the US, Taiwan would have the highest density of anti-ship missiles in the world, a source said yesterday. Taiwan is to wrap up mass production of the indigenous anti-ship missiles by the end of year, as the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology has been meeting production targets ahead of schedule, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said. Combined with the 400 Harpoon anti-ship missiles Taiwan expects to receive from the US by 2028, the nation would have
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
RSS