Typhoon Nepartak is expected to be at its closest to Taiwan tomorrow and Friday, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday.
As of 2pm yesterday, the eye of the storm was 1,630km southeast of the nation’s southernmost tip, Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), and was moving north-northwest at 30kph, bureau data showed.
It was packing maximum sustained winds of 144kph, with gusts reaching 180kph, the bureau said.
The bureau was unable to accurately predict whether the eye would make landfall on Taiwan or would veer north into waters to the east. Having grown in intensity from a tropical storm into a typhoon on Monday night, Nepartak is continuing to pick up strength because it has a small vertical wind shear — the change in wind direction with height in the atmosphere — and is passing over a warm body of water, the bureau said.
Nepartak — named after a Micronesian Kosrae warrior — is the first storm of this year’s Pacific typhoon season.
Ferry companies said they would suspend passenger services to and from Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) from today through Saturday.
Photo: CNA
Minister of Transportation and Communications Hochen Tan (賀陳旦) said he is fully confident that Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport would avoid flooding if the typhoon brings torrential rain over the next few days, after recent thunderstorms triggered flooding in the basement of Terminal 2 on two separate occasions.
Three preventive measures are to be taken to protect the airport from flooding, he said.
Authorities are to remove all possible blockages in the airport’s main water drainage system, put up concrete flood-prevention barriers in parking lots and install anti-flood gates, he said.
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