Strong Taiwan Quake Kills 9, Injures Hundreds
The earthquake was the most powerful to hit the island in 25 years. Dozens of people remained trapped, and many buildings were damaged, with the worst centered in the city of Hualien.
![[object Object]](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/04/03/multimedia/03taiwan-quake-briefing-carousel-add-bvzm/03taiwan-quake-briefing-carousel-add-bvzm-threeByTwoMediumAt2X.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp)
![[object Object]](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/04/03/multimedia/03taiwan-quake-blog-carousel-add-qtjf/03taiwan-quake-blog-carousel-add-qtjf-threeByTwoMediumAt2X.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp)
Taiwan was rocked Wednesday morning by the island’s strongest earthquake in a quarter century, a magnitude 7.4 tremor that killed at least nine people, injured more than 800 others and trapped dozens of people.
The heaviest damage was in Hualien County on the island’s east coast, a sleepy, scenic area prone to earthquakes. Footage from the aftermath showed a 10-story building there partially collapsed and leaning heavily to one side, from which residents emerged through windows and climbed down ladders, assisted by rescuers. Three hikers were killed after being hit by falling rocks on a hiking trail in Taroko National Park, according to the county government.
By late afternoon, officials said rescue efforts were underway to try to rescue 127 people who were trapped, many of them on hiking trails in Hualien.
One building in Changhua County, on the island’s west coast, collapsed entirely. The quake was felt throughout Taiwan and set off at least nine landslides, sending rocks tumbling onto Suhua Highway in Hualien, according to local media reports. Rail services were halted at one point across the island.
The earthquake, with an epicenter off Taiwan’s east coast, struck during the morning commute, shortly before 8 a.m. Taiwanese authorities said by 3 p.m., more than 100 aftershocks, many of them stronger than magnitude 5, had rumbled through the area.
In the capital, Taipei, buildings shook for over a minute from the initial quake. Taiwan is at the intersection of the Philippine Sea tectonic plate and the Eurasian plate, making it vulnerable to seismic activity. Hualien sits on multiple active faults, and 17 people died in a quake there in 2018.
Here is the latest:
The earthquake hit Taiwan as many people there were preparing to travel for Tomb Sweeping Day, a holiday across the Chinese-speaking world when people mourn the dead and make offerings at their graves. Officials warned the public to stay away from visiting tombs in mountain areas as a precaution, especially because rain was forecast in the coming days.
TSMC, the world’s biggest maker of advanced semiconductors, briefly evacuated workers from its factories but said a few hours later that they were returning to work. Chip production is highly precise, and even short shutdowns can cost millions of dollars.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Lai Ching-te, Taiwan’s vice president, who is also its president-elect, visited the city of Hualien this afternoon to assess the destruction and the rescue efforts, a government announcement said. Mr. Lai, who will become president in May, said the most urgent tasks were rescuing trapped residents and providing medical care. Next, Mr. Lai said, public services must be restored, including transportation, water and power. He said Taiwan Railway’s eastern line could be reopened by Thursday night.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Taiwan’s fire department has updated its figures, reporting that nine people have died and 934 others have been injured in the quake. Fifty-six people in Hualien County remain trapped.
Shake intensity
- +
- -
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Taiwan’s fire department reports that nine people have died and 882 others have been injured in Taiwan. In Hualien County, 131 people remain trapped.
Footage shows rocks tumbling down one side of Guishan Island, a popular spot for hiking known as Turtle Island, off the northeast coast of Taiwan. Officials said no fishermen or tourists were injured after the landslide.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The death toll has risen to nine, according to Taiwan government statistics.
Officials in Taiwan warned residents to not visit their relatives' tombs, especially in the mountains, this weekend during the holiday, known as Ching Ming, meant to honor them. There had already been 100 aftershocks and the forecast called for rain, which could make travel conditions on damaged roads more treacherous.
Crews are working to reach people trapped on blocked roads. As of 1 p.m. local time, roads were impassable due to damage and fallen rock in 19 places, according to the Ministry of Transportation. At least 77 people remain trapped. A bridge before Daqingshui Tunnel appeared to have completely collapsed.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Taiwan’s worst rail disaster in decades — a train derailment in 2021 that killed 49 people — took place on the first day of the Tomb Sweeping holiday period that year, in the same region as the earthquake.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The earthquake hit Taiwan as many people here were preparing to travel for Tomb Sweeping Day, or Ching Ming, a day across the Chinese-speaking world when people mourn their dead, especially by making offerings at their graves. Now those plans will be disrupted for many Taiwanese.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The holiday weekend would typically see a spike in travel as people visit family across Taiwan. Currently, both rail transport and highways are blocked in parts of Hualien, said Transport Minister Wang Guo-cai. Work is underway to restore rail transportation in Hualien, and two-way traffic is expected to be restored at noon on Thursday, he said.
Taiwan’s earthquake preparedness has evolved over the past few decades in response to some of the island’s largest and most destructive quakes.
In the years after a 7.6 magnitude earthquake in central Taiwan killed nearly 2,500 people in 1999, the authorities established an urban search-and-rescue team and opened several emergency medical operation centers, among other measures.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
At least seven people have died and 736 have been injured as a result of the earthquake, according to Taiwan’s fire department. Another 77 people remained trapped in Hualien County, many of them on hiking trails. Search and rescue operations are underway, said the fire department.
Aftershocks of magnitudes between 6.5 and 7 were likely to occur over the next three or four days, said Wu Chien-fu, director of the Taiwanese Central Weather Administration’s Seismology Center, at a news conference.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
As of 2 p.m., 711 people had been injured across Taiwan, the fire department said, and 77 people in Hualien County remained trapped. The four who were known to have died were in Hualien.
Hualien County on Taiwan’s east coast is a scenic, sleepy tourist area tucked away from the island’s urban centers, with a famous gorge and aquamarine waters. It also happens to sit on several active faults, making it prone to earthquakes.
The county has a population of about 300,000, according to the 2020 census, about a third of whom live in the coastal city of Hualien, the county seat. It is one of the most sparsely populated parts of Taiwan. About three hours by train from the capital, Taipei, the city describes itself as the first place on the island that’s touched by the sun.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The county government in Hualien released a list of people that had been hospitalized with injuries, which stood at 118 people as of midday Wednesday.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Across Taiwan, one building fell down entirely, in Changhua County on the west coast, and 15 buildings partially collapsed, Taiwan’s fire department said. Another 67 buildings were damaged. One of the partially collapsed structures was a warehouse in New Taipei City where four people were rescued, according to Taiwan’s Central News Agency. Another 12 were rescued at a separate New Taipei City building where the foundation sank into the ground.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Peggy Jiang, who manages The Good Kid, a children’s bookstore down the street from the partially collapsed Uranus Building in Hualien, said it was a good thing they had yet to open when the quake struck. The area is now blocked off by police and rescue vehicles. “Most people in Hualien are used to earthquakes,” she said. “But this one was particularly scary, many people ran in the street immediately afterward.”
Lin Jung, 36, who manages a shop selling sneakers in Hualien, said he had been at home getting ready to take his 16-month-old baby to a medical appointment when the earthquake struck. He said it felt at first like a series of small shocks, then “suddenly it turned to an intense earthquake shaking up and down.” The glass cover of a ceiling lamp fell and shattered. “All I could do was protect my baby.”
The magnitude 7.4 earthquake that struck Taiwan on Wednesday damaged many buildings and a major highway in Hualien, a city on the eastern coast, and it knocked out power as it rocked the island.
Across Taiwan, the quake and its aftershocks caused one building to completely collapse and 15 others to partially collapse, according to Taiwan’s fire department. Sixty-seven other buildings sustained damage.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Taiwan’s fire department said four people had been killed in the earthquake.
Across Taiwan, 40 flights have been canceled or delayed because of the earthquake, according to Taiwan’s Central Emergency Operation Center.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
President Tsai Ing-wen visited Taiwan’s national emergency response center this morning, where she was briefed about the response efforts underway by members of the ministries of defense, transportation, economic affairs and agriculture, as well as the fire department.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
TSMC, the world’s biggest maker of advanced semiconductors, said all personnel are safe after the morning earthquake, and that those evacuated from its factories were beginning to return to work. The company said it had suspended work at construction sites for the day and would resume work only after further inspection.
Reporting from Bangkok
Authorities in the Philippines have canceled all tsunami warnings, saying that their monitoring stations have not detected any significant sea level disturbances.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
In Hualien, the partly collapsed Uranus Building is in a part of town filled with restaurants, hotels and a popular night market. The front desk clerk at the True Friends Inn, a hotel about a block away from the Uranus Building, said the hotel was at nearly full capacity when the quake struck. No one was injured, the clerk said.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Derik du Plessis, a 44-year-old South African who has lived in Hualien for 17 years, described chaos and panic on the streets after the earthquake as people rushed to pick up their children and check on their houses. Roads were blocked off, he said, and walls had toppled onto cars. “Right now people seem to have calmed down but a lot of people are sitting on the road,” he said. “They don’t want to go into the buildings because there are still a lot of tremors.”
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
At least one person died in the quake this morning, according to Taiwan’s Fire Department. The fire department said it expected the number of deaths would rise as it received more injury reports from around the country.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
No deaths have been reported this morning in the aftermath of the quake. Rescuers have been dispatched to the collapsed buildings in Hualien, and the fire brigade has responded to a call about a person trapped in an elevator in Nantou, the neighboring county. Hualien is an especially earthquake-prone area of Taiwan, and 17 people died in a quake there in 2018.
Chen Yao-ching, 63, a tour guide living in Ji’an, a town in Hualien county, said he awoke this morning when the quake shook his home, sending glass jars falling from a table. “It was a little intense,” Chen said by phone. “I will be walking outside and taking a look around today. The aftershocks are still going on in the morning, I can still feel it from time to time.”
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Sunny Wang, a journalist based in Hualien, said rescuers were focused on the Uranus Building, which had tilted over, near collapse, from the earthquake. Many residents had managed to flee the building — which holds a mix of homes and shops — but some were missing, and rescuers were trying to find their way to people possibly caught in the basement.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Tsai Kuang-Hui, a retired teacher in Hualien, said that residents were staying outside, worried by the continued aftershocks that have shaken the area. “I’m trying to fix a broken water pipe. There’s a lot of water and gas pipes that have been broken,” he said by phone. Tsai said that he and his family were not injured, and that most of the worry focused on two taller buildings in urban Hualien that had tilted on their sides.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The world’s biggest maker of advanced semiconductors, TSMC, said it evacuated some of its factories, called fabs. The company said its safety systems were operating normally and that it was still assessing the impact. TSMC’s fabs are clustered along Taiwan’s west coast, away from the epicenter of the earthquake. Still, chip production is highly precise and even short shutdowns can cost millions of dollars.
The magnitude 7.4 earthquake that hit Taiwan on Wednesday morning was the strongest in 25 years, the island’s Central Weather Administration said.
At least four people died after the quake struck off Taiwan’s east coast, officials said.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Chiu Chao-Wen, a resident in the rural outskirts of Hualien, said that the quake had shaken homes in his area, smashing crockery and knocking over shelves, but none of the low-lying homes had collapsed. “It looks worse in the city where there are buildings tilted by the earthquake,” Chiu said. “Luckily for us our homes are one or two stories, so nothing so serious.” But, he added, dozens of aftershocks have left residents nervous.
Reporting from Bangkok
Authorities in the Philippines have downgraded the number of provinces that need to be immediately evacuated following the tsunami warning. People living in the coastal areas of four provinces — Batanes Islands, Cagayan, Ilocos Norte and Isabela — need to evacuate to higher grounds or move farther inland, the authorities said. Previously, the government had advised coastal residents in 23 provinces to leave.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
In central Taipei things are mostly quiet, though small signs of the tremblor are present. Workmen check lifts and sidewalks, and caution tape surrounds a portion of a building that broke off and fell to the sidewalks.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The subway systems in Taipei and the southern city of Kaohsiung were closed on Wednesday morning during the typically busy commuter hour. After inspections, some lines have begun to reopen.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
In central Taipei around 10 a.m., service on the subway's red line had been restored, with trains running both ways, as several workers emerged from a tunnel.
The U.S. Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said that while national authorities may still issue alerts, “the tsunami threat has now largely passed.”
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
There were at least nine landslides on the Suhua Highway along the east coast in Hualien, where part of the road has collapsed, according to Taiwan’s Central News Agency. The highway is currently closed.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Although damage appears to be limited in the capital, Taipei, many taller buildings were shaken hard this morning. As I walked down the stairs from my building, landings were cluttered with broken items like vases and statues as people began to clean up.
Reporting from Bangkok
Authorities in the Philippines have advised people living in the coastal areas of 23 provinces to immediately evacuate to higher ground or move farther inland. The first tsunami waves will arrive between 8:33 a.m. to 10:33 a.m. local time, said the authorities, who warned that they “may not be the largest” and could continue for hours.
Reporting from Tokyo
Japan’s meteorological agency has downgraded its tsunami warning to advisories for Miyako island, the Yaeyama region and Okinawa’s main island.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
In Hualien, the county government opened evacuation areas for people to take shelter — including local high school gymnasiums and sporting grounds — as aftershocks continue to roll through the area.
Reporting from Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s weather forecast agency said it had received over a hundred reports of tremors on Wednesday morning after the earthquake in Taiwan. The tremors, graded a three on the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scale, felt similar to the vibration of a passing truck, the Hong Kong Observatory said.
The U.S. Geological Survey forecast tsunami waves of 1 to 3 meters along some coastal areas in China and Taiwan, and 0.3 to 1 meters for parts of Japan. Smaller tsunami waves of 0.3 meters or less above tide level are possible across a wide swath of the region, from Guam to Indonesia to Vietnam, according to the agency.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The quake was the strongest to strike Taiwan in 25 years, according to Taiwan’s Central Weather Administration.
Power cuts and internet outages have been reported in parts of Taiwan after the quake, according to NetBlocks, a watchdog organization that monitors cybersecurity and the governance of the Internet.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Service on Taiwan’s high speed rail was suspended across the entire system on Wednesday morning. School and classes were suspended in Hualien County.
All Nippon Airlines has suspended all flights to and from Naha airport on the main Okinawa island as well as flights from Miyako and Ishigaki islands. JAL is suspending or delaying some flights from Naha.
Reporting from Tokyo
In one post on X that had been liked more than 1,700 times, a resident of Okinawa said that there was such little shaking on the island that people might not even be aware of the tsunami warnings. “Only people watching TV can tell,” the tweet read.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
The quake could be felt across the island, according to Taiwan’s Central News Agency. Local television broadcaster TVBS showed a landslide sent rocks cascading across the Suhua Highway in Hualien, near the epicenter.
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan
Multiple aftershocks could be felt in the capital, Taipei, this morning following the quake. In Hualien, near the epicenter, a nine-story building has partly collapsed. Taiwan television reports that neighbors are concerned people may still be trapped in the building.
Reporting from Tokyo
Tsunami waves hit the Japanese island of Yonaguni at 9:18 a.m. and reached heights of about 30 centimeters — nearly a foot. According to NHK, such waves carry power equivalent to about 440 pounds and could easily knock adults off their feet. Waves started hitting the island of Ishigaki at 9:32 a.m.
Related Content
Lam Yik Fei for The New York Times
Byambasuren Byamba-Ochir/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Rene Johnston/Toronto Star, via Getty Images
Zhang Zhi/Red Star News/Visual China Group, via Getty Images
Pool photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno
The New York Times
Editors’ Picks
NBCUniversal
Lucy Jones
Josefina Santos for The New York Times
No comments:
Post a Comment