Workers cleared fallen trees and shop owners swept up debris yesterday after one of the biggest typhoons to hit the nation in decades claimed at least two lives.
Typhoon Kong-rey was packing winds of 184kph when it slammed into eastern Taiwan on Thursday, uprooting trees, triggering floods and landslides, and knocking out power as it swept across the nation.
A 56-year-old female foreign national died from her injuries after the small truck she was in was struck by a falling tree on Provincial Highway 14A early on Thursday.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
The second death was reported at 8pm in Taipei on Thursday after a 48-year-old man was killed by a utility pole. The man was reportedly hit by the pole, which was brought down by a falling tree, while he walked around Neihu District (內湖).
A 55-year-old man attempting to repair a roof on the fifth floor of a building in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District (中和) fell to his death on Thursday.
However, the Central Emergency Operations Center said his death was not considered to have been caused by the typhoon.
Photo courtesy of Kaohsiung City’s Liouguei Precinct via CNA
As of yesterday morning, the typhoon had injured 515 people, it said.
Four people who went hunting in the mountains of central Taiwan on Wednesday were still unaccounted for, it added.
Two Czech hikers who were trapped in Taroko Gorge in Hualien County during the typhoon were rescued yesterday.
Photo: Angie Teo, Reuters
By yesterday morning, 11,588 people had been evacuated and 134 emergency shelters had been set up in 13 municipalities, with 2,620 people taking shelter, the center said.
Kong-rey weakened to a tropical storm as it moved across the Taiwan Strait toward China yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said.
In Taiwan, life was returning to normal, with offices, restaurants and schools reopening.
Photo:: Angie Teo, Reuters
However, about 78,500 households were still without power, and 191 domestic and international flights were cancelled. Dozens of ferry services and some train lines remained suspended. Kong-rey dumped more than 1m of water in some of the hardest-hit areas along the east coast, the CWA said.
Torrential rain in Yilan County’s Toucheng Township (頭城) sent mud and rocks flowing into a building in a resident’s backyard.
The 55-year-old resident, surnamed Wu (吳), said he was watching television on Thursday morning when he heard a strange “rumbling sound.”
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
“When I opened the door, I saw a mudslide coming down slowly. I picked up my car key and rushed out,” Wu said.
In Taitung County, where the storm made landfall, a fire department official said there had been some landslides and flooding, but no reports of “severe damage.”
“It’s mostly trees falling down and crushing into electricity poles that caused a power outage,” said the official, who gave only his surname, Huang (黃).
Further north in Hualien County, some residents living in the mountains were assessing the damage to houses hit by landslides.
“There are mud, small rocks, big rocks and driftwood — I don’t know where they came from,” a resident in Jhuoxi Village (卓溪) told local news channel TVBS. “I can’t go inside [my home]. In some houses the mudslides are more than waist-high; it’s a little better in my home which is below the knees.”
Across the nation, workers were up before dawn clearing trees, branches and other debris from roads.
“We started cleaning from 5am till now and have only cleaned one road section. It took us about two-and-a-half hours,” a member of the New Taipei City cleaning crew surnamed Lee (李) said.
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