More than 200 international and domestic flights were canceled or delayed yesterday as Typhoon Fitow moved near the nation’s northern coast, the Civil Aeronautics Administration said yesterday.
By 5:30pm yesterday, statistics from the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) showed the center of typhoon was located 190km northeast of Taipei. It was moving northwest at 15kph, with the maximum wind speed measured near the center topping 137kph. The radius of the storm reached 250km.
The bureau said the land alert for the typhoon would be lifted before 8am today as the typhoon is expected to move toward China, adding that the typhoon’s power would gradually weaken.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Except for Lienchiang County, which had announced last night that both classes and work will be canceled this morning, all other areas in Taiwan, including the outlying Penghu and Kinmen counties, have announced work and school will proceed as normal today.
The Central Emergency Operation Center reported that 224 residents in Hsinchu County’s Jianshi (尖石) and Wufong (五峰) townships were forced to evacuate due to heavy rainfall brought by Fitow.
The Directorate General of Highways (DGH) closed parts of Provincial Highway No. 7 because mudflows had disrupted the traffic.
It also closed two other sections of the highway and Yilan County Highway No. 51 because they posed a threat to motorists. Heavy rainfall meant red alerts for mudflows were placed on 38 rivers around the country, most of which were in Hsinchu County.
The typhoon had at one point caused power outages affecting approximately 6,900 households nationwide, mostly in Yilan County, New Taipei City and Greater Taichung.
According to the CWB , Niaozuishan (鳥嘴山) in Hsinchu County had the highest accumulated rainfall, 536mm, by 7pm yesterday. It was followed by Fushan (福山) in New Taipei City and Kaoyi (高義) in Taoyun County, with their accumulated rainfall topping 402mm and 377mm respectively.
The wind in Pengjia Islet (彭佳嶼) was found to have reached Level 14 on the Beaufort scale. The wind in Lanyu (蘭嶼) in Taitung County and Wuchi (梧棲) in Greater Taichung reached Level 11 and Level 10, respectively.
Aside from Fitow, tropical storm Danas turned into a typhoon at 8am yesterday. Yesterday evening, the center of Danas was located 1,460km east of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻). It was moving northwest at 31kph.
Bureau forecaster Hsieh Ming-chang (謝明昌) said the two typhoons would be about 1,000km apart today because Danas was moving twice as fast as Fitow.
The two are unlikely to produce the Fujiwhara effect, which would cause the typhoon to slow down because of its interaction with another nearby storm.
“Fitow is forecast to make landfall in China early [today], which would reduce its power and cause rainfall in Taiwan to ease,” Hsieh said.
“Danas, on the other hand, will accelerate and move northward and should not affect the weather in Taiwan,” he added.
GET TO SAFETY: Authorities were scrambling to evacuate nearly 700 people in Hualien County to prepare for overflow from a natural dam formed by a previous typhoon Typhoon Podul yesterday intensified and accelerated as it neared Taiwan, with the impact expected to be felt overnight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, while the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration announced that schools and government offices in most areas of southern and eastern Taiwan would be closed today. The affected regions are Tainan, Kaohsiung and Chiayi City, and Yunlin, Chiayi, Pingtung, Hualien and Taitung counties, as well as the outlying Penghu County. As of 10pm last night, the storm was about 370km east-southeast of Taitung County, moving west-northwest at 27kph, CWA data showed. With a radius of 120km, Podul is carrying maximum sustained
President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday criticized the nuclear energy referendum scheduled for Saturday next week, saying that holding the plebiscite before the government can conduct safety evaluations is a denial of the public’s right to make informed decisions. Lai, who is also the chairman of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), made the comments at the party’s Central Standing Committee meeting at its headquarters in Taipei. ‘NO’ “I will go to the ballot box on Saturday next week to cast a ‘no’ vote, as we all should do,” he said as he called on the public to reject the proposition to reactivate the decommissioned
US President Donald Trump on Friday said that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) told him China would not invade Taiwan while Trump is in office. Trump made the remarks in an interview with Fox News, ahead of talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. “I will tell you, you know, you have a very similar thing with President Xi of China and Taiwan, but I don’t believe there’s any way it’s going to happen as long as I’m here. We’ll see,” Trump said during an interview on Fox News’ Special Report. “He told me: ‘I will never do
EXCEPTIONS: Some people could be allowed to reclaim citizenship for humanitarian reasons or because of their contributions to the nation, the interior ministry said Taiwan would soon unveil new rules banning Taiwanese residents of China from reclaiming their citizenship if they participated in Beijing’s propaganda activities, the Ministry of the Interior said on Monday. The measures were drafted following President William Lai’s (賴清德) March 13 directive that the government counter China’s espionage and influence campaigns aimed at undermining Taiwan’s sovereignty, the ministry said in a preview of the rules. The changes would affect Taiwanese who lost their citizenship after becoming permanent residents of China or obtaining passports issued by China, it said. Under the measures, former Taiwanese nationals living in China who had made statements denying the
RSS