Typhoon Krathon as of yesterday had killed two people and injured 667, while one person was still missing, the Central Emergency Operations Center told a news conference, warning people to avoid outdoor activities in mountainous areas even though sea and land warnings have been lifted.
Work and classes were canceled in some areas of New Taipei City for today.
Although the storm has weakened into a tropical depression, people in mountainous areas are advised against going outdoors, as the soil is saturated due to heavy rainfall, Deputy Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Yen-po (陳彥伯) said.
Photo courtesy of the army
One of the two who died was a man in Hualien County surnamed Lai (賴), 70, who was trimming a tree when he fell from a ladder from a height of about 3m.
He passed away in a hospital on Wednesday, the center said.
The other person who died was a man surnamed Lee (李), 66, who was driving a car when he struck a boulder that had had fallen onto a road in Taitung County.
Photo copied by CNA
He passed away in a hospital on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, a migrant worker who reportedly fell into the sea at a beach in Yunlin County was still missing, as the waves were too strong for search-and-rescue operations, the center said.
A report of a person being swept away by floodwaters at Shueiyuan Bridge (水源橋) in Hualien County’s Sioulin Township (秀林) has been proven false, it said, adding that 2,380 of 7,402 typhoon-related incidents have been resolved.
Photo: Ritchie B. Tongo, EPA-EFE
Krathon caused serious damage after making landfall in Kaohsiung on Thursday, with more than 2,000 trees in the city being blown over.
Wind speeds reached 203kph in Kaohsiung on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said.
Kaohsiung City Government data showed that 1,951 trees had to be cleared and road closures had led to traffic jams.
Photo copied by Lin Chia-tung, Taipei Times
A man surnamed Chen (陳) yesterday told reporters that it is typically a 20-minute drive from Kaohsiung’s Fongshan District (鳳山) to Zuoying District (左營), but has taken more than 40 minutes since the storm.
Extremely torrential rain continued yesterday evening along the northern coast and in Keelung, accumulating more than 500mm in 24 hours in New Taipei City’s Jinshan District (金山), the CWA said.
Work and classes are canceled for today in Wanli (萬里), Jinshan, Shihmen (石門) and Sanjhih (三芝) districts in New Taipei City amid widespread flooding.
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
At least a dozen vehicles belonging to an incineration plant in Keelung were damaged after a landslide undermined the lot they were parked in on Thursday night, the Keelung Bureau of Environmental Protection said.
No one was trapped or injured in the incident, it said.
Krathon set three new records in Taiwan’s typhoon history, the CWA told a news conference yesterday.
It made landfall four days and four hours after the sea warning was issued, the longest delay ever, it said.
It was also the first typhoon to land in Kaohsiung in October and the first to make the CWA convene remote meetings with local governments for three days in a row, it said, adding that it was the first typhoon to make landfall in Kaohsiung in 47 years.
Media personality Frances Huang (黃光芹) yesterday said that the CWA had given “ridiculous forecasts,” citing the four-day gap between the sea warning and landfall.
The CWA is irresponsible to let local governments decide whether to suspend work and classes, and slow responses due to the lack of a big database show that its technology is falling behind meteorological departments in Western countries, despite its collaboration with Nvidia Corp to promote artificial intelligence (AI), Huang said.
Many of Huang’s remarks are far from the truth, CWA Weather Forecast Center Director Chen Yi-liang (陳怡良) said.
The CWA updated forecasts for rain and wind every three hours, and issued a typhoon warning report every hour while the sea and land warnings were in effect, with the information open to the public and reported to all local governments, he said.
Local governments think comprehensively when deciding whether to suspend work and classes, and meteorological reports are just for their reference, he said, adding that the CWA supported local governments in making informed decisions via continued remote meetings.
AI technology has been employed to make weather forecasts, but its performance would improve with more new data, he said.
“The CWA plans to use AI to its advantage and continue to make improvements,” he added.
Meanwhile, Taiwan Power Co said that electricity had been restored to more than 80 percent of the 294,625 households that had lost power during the storm.
As of yesterday evening, 53,923 homes were still without power, with personnel working to restore lines by later in the evening, it said.
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