Taiwan’s strongest earthquake in 25 years kills at least seven
Astrong earthquake hit eastern Taiwan on Wednesday, killing at least seven people and causing severe damage to several buildings, including some that partially collapsed.
The quake, which struck just before 8 a.m. local time, had a preliminary magnitude of 7.4, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The epicenter was about 11 miles south of Hualien, a city on Taiwan’s east coast, the USGS said.
The seven people killed were all in Hualien County, and more than 700 were injured in Hualien and other parts of Taiwan, Taiwan’s National Fire Agency reported.
Local media reports and photos from residents showed partially collapsed buildings in Hualien. Authorities said more than two dozen apartment towers, houses and other buildings were severely damaged, most of them in Hualien, with an unknown number of people trapped inside. Officials also reported burst water pipes and loss of electricity in some areas near the epicenter.
The office of Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing -wen said she had dispatched the military to the area to help with disaster relief.
The quake was the strongest to strike Taiwan since 1999, according to a search of the USGS database. The initial quake was followed by powerful aftershocks of magnitude 6.5 and 5.7, the USGS said.
Images carried by local media showed the collapse of a roadway linking Hualien with cities to the north.
Chang Li-hsin, a restaurant owner in central Hualien, was preparing to open when the earthquake struck.
“Tables and chairs suddenly began shaking,” she said. “The menu hung on the wall was shaken off, and a crack appeared in the wall.”
Chang shouted to her husband in the kitchen and the couple ran out of the restaurant. Dozens of people were already on the street.
“I can’t remember the last time there was a quake of this magnitude,” Chang said.
A few hundred yards away a building had tilted violently on its side. It had apartments, a small hostel with cafes and snack shops on its ground floor, Chang said. A group of firefighters arrived about 15 minutes later. They set up a ladder and began prying open a window fitted with iron security bars to rescue the people trapped inside, she said.
Hualien, a city of about 100,000 people, sits between the steep mountains of Taiwan’s east coast and the sea. The city and the larger Hualien County that surround it experience frequent earthquakes. A magnitude 6.4 earthquake centered in Hualien in 2018 killed at least 17 people and left some buildings severely tilted. The city is located just south of Taroko National Park, a leading destination for tourists, with a deep gorge along the Liwu River where it cuts into the mountains.
“Foreign visitors, maybe they’re a little nervous because they’ve never seen anything like this,” said Huang Huichih, a coffee-shop owner in Hualien who had to clear dozens of shattered cups and glass items after the quake hit. “But Hualien people, we’ve had this experience.”
In 1999 a magnitude-7.6 earthquake in central Taiwan killed more than 2,400 people and injured more than 11,000. It was Taiwan’s deadliest since a quake in 1935.
The Taiwan Railway Corp. said the line between Jiaoxi and Fenglin in eastern Taiwan was halted and that a large rockfall was discovered on the line between the Horen and Chongde stations, near Hualien. Taiwan’s high-speed rail system said about 20 of its trains were affected, but there were no reports of damage or injuries.
Ma Chin-hsiung, a 52-yearold Hualien resident, said Wednesday’s earthquake appeared to do more damage to the city’s transportation links with the rest of the island compared with other recent quakes, pointing to reports of severe damage to the winding seaside road that runs northward from Hualien to the neighboring county of Yilan.
Ma said he wasn’t hurt by the quake, but the shaking knocked his television onto the floor and broke it. He said he went ahead with his grocery shopping and found that a wall had collapsed at the market he frequents, though many vendors were still operating.
“There are too many unpredictable situations, but we must still do the necessary shopping,” Ma said.
The metro system in Taipei, Taiwan’s capital, said it was halting operations according to its standard procedure to carry out checks of its system. No problems had been found so far, it said.
The world’s largest producer of advanced semiconductors , Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing , said that workers were returning to their stations after being evacuated from some of its semiconductor-fabrication plants following the quake. The company’s safety systems are operating normally and it is confirming details of the quake’s impact, TSMC said.
TSMC is based in Hsinchu, near Taipei, and its biggest plants are all located on the western side of the island, opposite where the quake struck. TSMC produces the chips that run Apple ’s iPhones and Nvidia ’s GPUs.
The Japan Meteorological Agency issued a tsunami warning for southern Okinawa prefecture, the part of Japan that is closest to Taiwan, immediately after the quake hit. The tsunami warning was lifted a few hours later.
The agency said a tsunami of 30 centimeters, or about 1 foot, was recorded at a small island close to the epicenter at 9:18 a.m. local time.
No damage or injuries were immediately reported in Japan, a Japanese government spokesman said.
The initial quake, the strongest to strike Taiwan since 1999, was followed by aftershocks of magnitude 6.5 and 5.7