More seismic activity is expected in the coming week or two, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said after a magnitude 5.6 earthquake on the Richter scale jolted Chiayi County yesterday morning.
The hypocenter of the quake, which occurred at 10:11am, was in Dapu Township (大埔) at a depth of 10km, CWA data showed.
The quake’s intensity, which measures the perceptible effects of a seismic event, was highest in Chiayi County, where it registered 5 on Taiwan’s seven-tier scale.
Photo: CNA
That was followed shortly afterward by at least a dozen smaller quakes in Dapu. No casualties were reported.
The agency’s Seismological Center said the series of earthquakes were aftershocks of the magnitude 6.4 earthquake that struck Dapu on Tuesday last week.
“Although the frequency of aftershocks from the Jan. 21 quake has gradually decreased recently, there is still a possibility of larger-scale aftershocks in the next one to two weeks,” center head Ho Mei-yi (何美儀) said.
Photo courtesy of the Tainan Fire Bureau via CNA
Taiwan is at the junction of the Eurasian Plate and the Philippine Sea Plate. Interactions between the two plates causes frequent seismic activity in the eastern half of Taiwan proper, she said.
“As tectonic stress from that activity moves toward the western half of the island and gradually accumulates there, it begins to cause earthquakes there as well,” she said, adding that last week’s earthquake was one such example.
There are numerous fault lines in the area around Chiayi and Tainan, and the interaction of the nearby tectonic plates makes the area an earthquake hotspot, she said.
Aftershocks of last week’s earthquake that reached magnitude 5.5 or above occurred on Saturday, Sunday and yesterday, she said.
“The aftershocks that have occurred to date have been distributed over a wide area, and have not followed any clear trend. This is due to the complex interlacing of the fault lines and the distribution of the seismic energy,” she said.
Yesterday alone, 134 aftershocks were recorded after the quake, she said, adding that 38 were significantly felt and 96 were small regional earthquakes.
As seismologists are unable to predict when the frequency of earthquakes in the area would return to normal, and as huge aftershocks are still expected in the coming one to two weeks, the public should remain vigilant, she said.
Some trains on the Taiwan High Speed Rail network were delayed by up to 70 minutes after yesterday’s quake, the operator said, adding that it had deployed an emergency response team and carried out operational checks.
All speed limits were lifted at 12:45pm after it was confirmed there were no security risks.
Taiwan Railway Corp (臺鐵) reduced train speeds to between 30kph and 60kph as a safety measure, and resumed normal operations after tests showed no abnormalities.
No injuries were reported in the Southern Taiwan Science Park (南部科學園區), where some operations at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) were temporarily halted as a precaution.
The Zengwen Reservoir’s (曾文水庫) management office said it had received reports of rocks falling from a nearby slope, but no damage or injuries were reported.
The Southern Region Water Resources Branch advised the public to avoid mountainous areas in the county in the wake of the aftershocks.
The Dapu Township Office reported that the bronze statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣中正) installed in the reservoir collapsed and sank into the water.
The statue had previously been damaged due to years of exposure to wind, rain and the sun, and was restored by the township two years ago, Dapu Township Mayor Wu Min-hsun (吳明勳) said.
“However, the recent earthquakes damaged it again, and then it suddenly collapsed,” he said, adding that whether to salvage it would need to be discussed, as the reservoir is currently at capacity.
Additional reporting by Liu Wan-chun, Tsai Tsung-hsun, CNA and AP
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