Typhoon Lekima, which sideswiped northern Taiwan from late Thursday through early yesterday, and a strong earthquake on Thursday morning left two people dead, 11 injured and more than 3,000 homes without electricity overnight, the Central Emergency Operations Center said.
According to a situation report released by the center at 7pm yesterday, one of the casualties was a 64-year-old man who on Thursday fell to his death from a tree in Taipei while attempting to trim branches as a precautionary measure against the typhoon.
The other fatality was a woman in her 60s who was crushed by a fallen clothes rack, hangers and clothes at her house in New Taipei City when a magnitude 6 earthquake struck northeastern Taiwan, the report said.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
An initial investigation found that she might have been knocked unconscious after being hit by the metal rack and hangers, and then suffocated under more than 100kg of clothes that smothered her face, it said.
Of the nine injuries, five happened in Taipei and two each in Yilan and Hualien counties, it added.
Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) said that it was working around the clock to restore electricity to about 1,300 households after Typhoon Lekima caused blackouts in 80,457 homes.
Photo: CNA
As of 7pm yesterday, 1,333 households still did not have electricity, the state-run utility said, adding that 800 workers had been deployed to resolve the issue.
The areas affected by the blackout are in Taoyuan, as well as New Taipei City’s Tamsui (淡水), Jhonghe (中和) and Tucheng (土城) districts, Taipower said.
Lekima, the ninth Pacific typhoon this year, was about 270km north-northeast of Taipei as of 7pm yesterday, Central Weather Bureau data showed.
It was moving northwest toward China at 15kph, packing maximum sustained winds of 173kph and gusts of up to 209kph, the bureau said.
The bureau lifted its land warning for Lekima at 8:30pm yesterday.
Meanwhile, the amount of rainfall was expected to increase from yesterday evening through today, concentrated in mountainous areas in southern Taiwan and leading to the possibility of landslides, the center said.
The quality of water could be temporarily affected in Taipei, New Taipei City and central Taiwan, it added.
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