Avoiding disaster is the most important work in disaster prevention, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in Kaohsiung yesterday while summing up the lessons his administration learned from Typhoon Morakot last August.
In a forum organized to mark the approaching anniversary of the typhoon on Sunday, the president said his administration would now concentrate on “preparing in advance and deploying before disaster.”
The president, whose approval ratings plunged because of his administration’s slow and disorderly response to Morakot, said the government’s relief operation was 10 times faster than the response to the 921 Earthquake in 1999, earthquake in some ways, but his administration came under fire anyway.
Saying that relief operators could not reach some of the disaster areas immediately because the bad weather made it impossible for helicopters to land, the president added that even gods would be helpless in such a situation.
However, he said, some disasters can be prevented, adding that disaster-prevention experts and volunteers from the Council of Agriculture’s Soil and Water Conservation Bureau would alert residents in mudslide-prone areas to evacuate in the event of danger, which will prevent casualties.
Officials encouraged residents in areas prone to mudslides to evacuate before Morakot, “but they did not do enough,” Ma said.
Morakot triggered widespread flooding and mudslides the likes of which had not been seen in five decades in Taiwan, causing 619 deaths and leaving 76 people unaccounted for.
Evacuations were carried out more thoroughly when Typhoon Parma barreled through Taiwan on Oct. 5 last year, which significantly reduced the number of casualties, the president said.
“Better safe than sorry,” the president said, adding that ordering evacuations for typhoons that turn out to be no more than stiff breezes is better than risking large-scale loss of life.
He urged the participants to the forum, notably the commissioners of the counties hard-hit by Morakot, to be vigilant whenever there are typhoon warnings and to take action accordingly.
Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), who took office after premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) stepped down to take the blame for the government’s bungled post-Morakot relief operations, lauded the legislature for approving a bill to facilitate post-typhoon reconstruction.
He also said the legislature’s approval of an Executive Yuan request to transfer the National Fire Agency under the Ministry of the Interior to the Disaster Prevention and Protection Agency would speed up disaster relief operations.
In related news, although typhoon season lasts from July to September, last month was the sixth in the past 20 years during which no typhoon was recorded, the Central Weather Bureau said on Saturday.
The previous five years in which no typhoon hit Taiwan in July were 1992, 1993, 1997, 1999 and 2007.
However, the bureau said that in years with no typhoons in July, strong typhoons were recorded in August and September, or from August to October, that same year.
Only three typhoons developed in the northwestern Pacific Ocean this year and none hit Taiwan, the bureau said.
The bureau had previously forecast that two to four typhoons would hit Taiwan this year — less than the average of three to five.
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