Tropical Storm Gaemi has intensified slightly as it heads toward Taiwan, where it is expected to affect the country in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday.
As of 8am yesterday, the 120km-radius storm was 800km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, moving at 9kph northwest, the agency said.
A sea warning for Gaemi could be issued tonight at the earliest, it said, adding that the storm is projected to be closest to Taiwan on Wednesday or Thursday.
Photo courtesy of the Central Weather Administration
Gaemi’s potential effect on Taiwan remains unclear, as that would depend on its direction, radius and intensity, forecasters said.
Former Weather Forecast Center director Daniel Wu (吳德榮), who is now an adjunct associate professor of atmospheric sciences at National Central University, said the storm is likely to intensify today, when it could grow to a radius of 220km as it approaches waters east of Taiwan.
Ferry services between Taitung County and Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and and Green Island (綠島) would be suspended tomorrow and Wednesday.
Whether services would resume on Thursday would depend on the storm’s development, port authorities said.
Meanwhile, the CWA yesterday reported that the fourth storm of this year’s Pacific typhoon season has formed in the South China Sea, but is not expected to affect Taiwan.
CWA data released at 2pm yesterday showed that Tropical Storm Prapiroon was off the Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島), moving north-northwest at 14kph.
It is projected to make landfall in China’s Hainan today, posing no direct threat to Taiwan, the CWA said.
Prapiroon and Gaemi are unlikely to form a Fujiwhara effect, or binary interaction — a phenomenon that can occur when two nearby storm vortices move around each other, potentially merging into one — as they are 1,500km apart, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said.
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck off the coast of Hualien County in eastern Taiwan at 7pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter of the temblor was at sea, about 69.9km south of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 30.9km, it said. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County’s Changbin Township (長濱), where it measured 5 on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 4 in Hualien, Nantou, Chiayi, Yunlin, Changhua and Miaoli counties, as well as
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