Heavy rain in the wake of Typhoon Khanun lashed mountainous areas of Taiwan yesterday, causing floods and landslides that blocked roads and stranded hundreds of people as authorities rushed to restore transportation links.
The Directorate-General of Highways said that rain in Nantou County led to multiple mudslides and landslides along Provincial Highway No. 14, the No. 14A branch from Wushe (霧社) to Dayuling (大禹嶺) in Renai Township (仁愛), and on township roads 71, 83, 85 and 89.
Renai had 939.5mm of rain in a 72-hour period, Central Weather Bureau (CWB) data showed.
Photo: Tung Chen-kuo, Taipei Times
Aside from Jhongjheng (中正), Hujhu (互助) and Nanfeng (南豐) villages, which were still accessible, other places on the affected roads are like islands, and risk running short on supplies, including fresh water, officials said.
Nantou County Commissioner Hsu Shu-hua (許淑華), during an inspection of the Nanfeng section of Provincial Highway No. 14 yesterday morning, said that the Nantou County Government has asked the Executive Yuan to work with the Ministry of National Defense to have military personnel ready to assist with disaster relief efforts.
The Reservist Command has about 300 personnel it could mobilize in the region and its commander was among those in the group making the inspection.
Photo courtesy of a reader
A gas station in Renai was buried by landslides and the Lilai Hot Spring Hotel (麗來溫泉飯店) in the township’s Lushan Hot Springs (盧山溫泉) area was in danger of collapse as part of its foundations had been washed away, officials said.
The county government said that experts would assess whether the resort is safe to operate and, if not, determine the best way to demolish the building.
A garage in the Lushan Hot Springs area, which has not been used for more than a decade due to landslide concerns, also lost part of its foundation in a landslide, officials said.
National Chi Nan University president Wu Tung-hsing (武東星) said that the institution has offered the use of air-conditioned graduate student dormitories for locals displaced by the typhoon, especially people from Nanfeng and Chungyang (春陽) villages and the Lushan area.
In Miaoli County, widespread flooding was reported in Sanyi (三義) and Yuanli (苑裡) townships, prompting the local fire bureau to dispatch personnel to rescue people trapped in homes or vehicles.
Up to 303 households in Jhunan Township (竹南) lost power. Electricity was restored later in the day, officials said.
Trees and utility poles fell in Hsinchu County, blocking County Road No. 122 near the 48.5km marker in Wufeng Township (五峰).
In mountainous districts of Kaohsiung, more than 900 residents were evacuated as a precautionary measure following torrential rainfall.
Kaohsiung’s Namasiya District (那瑪夏) had accumulated more than 210mm of rain in 24 hours as of 9:30am yesterday, data from weather stations showed.
With a combination of southwesterly wind and gusts from the extremities of Typhoon Khanun, monitoring stations in Kaohsiung, as well as Pingtung, Miaoli and Chiayi counties, had each recorded more than 200mm of rain in the 12 hours to noon yesterday, the CWB said.
Heavy rain was forecast to continue over the weekend, although at a reduced level, it said, adding that warnings remained for landslides in mountainous areas in central and southern Taiwan.
Japan has deployed long-range missiles in a southwestern region near China, the Japanese defense minister said yesterday, at a time when ties with Beijing are at their lowest in recent years. The missiles were installed in Kumamoto in the southern region of Kyushu, as Japan is attempting to shore up its military capacity as China steps up naval activity in the East China Sea. “Standoff defense capabilities enable us to counter the threat of enemy forces attempting to invade our country ... while ensuring the safety of our personnel,” Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. “This is an extremely important initiative for
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today accepted an invitation from Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to lead a delegation to China next month, saying she hopes to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations and bring stability to the Taiwan Strait. “I am grateful and happy to accept this invitation,” Cheng said in a statement from the KMT chairperson’s office. Cheng said she hopes both sides can work together to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations, enhance exchange and cooperation, bring stability to the Taiwan Strait and improve people’s livelihoods. At today's news conference, Cheng said any efforts to
MORE POPULAR: Taiwan Pass sales increased by 59 percent during the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the Tourism Administration said The Tourism Administration yesterday said that it has streamlined the Taiwan Pass, with two versions available for purchase beginning today. The tourism agency has made the pass available to international tourists since 2024, allowing them to access the high-speed rail, Taiwan Railway Corp services, four MRT systems and four Taiwan Tourist Shuttles. Previously, five types of Taiwan Pass were available, but some tourists have said that the offerings were too complicated. The agency said only two types of Taiwan Pass would be available, starting from a three-day pass with the high-speed rail and a three-day pass with Taiwan Railway Corp. The former costs NT$2,800
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
RSS