Hualien:

Five earthquakes struck Shoufeng Township, Hualien County, in eastern Taiwan on Monday within just 9 minutes, as reported by Central News Agency Focus Taiwan.

The seismic activity occurred between 5:08 pm and 5:17 pm (local time).

“Five #earthquakes struck Shoufeng Township, Hualien County, eastern Taiwan, in 9 minutes between 5:08 p.m. and 5:17 p.m. (UTC+8),” CNA Focus Taiwan posted on X.

Two weeks ago, a powerful earthquake measuring 7.4 on the Richter Scale rocked Taiwan’s eastern shores, leaving four people dead and over 700 others injured.

“Notable quake, preliminary info: M 6.5 – 11 km NE of Hualien City, Taiwan,” the US Geological Survey (USGS) said in a post on X.

The quake that struck Hualien City on April 3 killed four people and injured more than 700 others, the National Fire Agency said while adding that of those injured, 132 are in Hualien County, near the epicentre of the quake.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Taipei:

Taiwan’s capital was shaken by a “strong” earthquake early Monday evening, AFP staff reported, with the Central Weather Administration saying it was a magnitude-5.5 tremor originating in eastern Hualien.

The region was the epicentre of a magnitude-7.4 quake that hit on April 3, causing landslides around the mountainous region that blocked off roads, while buildings in the main Hualien city were badly damaged.

At least 17 were killed in the quake, with the latest body discovered on April 13 in a quarry.

Monday’s quake hit Taiwan at around 5:08 pm local time (0908 GMT) and could be felt in the capital Taipei.

US Geological Survey put it at 5.3 magnitude, with a depth of 8.9 kilometres.

“It felt like one of the strongest quakes or aftershocks since the big one earlier this month,” an AFP staffer said.

Hualien’s fire department said in a short post on its official social media channel that they had dispatched teams to inspect of any disaster from the quake.

“We will continue to monitor the situation and report in a timely manner.”

Taiwan sees frequent quakes as it is located at the junction of two tectonic plates.

The April 3 quake was followed by hundreds of aftershocks, which caused rockfalls around Hualien.

It was the most serious in Taiwan since 1999 when a magnitude of 7.6 hit the island.

The death count then was far higher — with 2,400 people killed in the deadliest natural disaster in the island’s history.

Stricter building regulations — including enhanced seismic requirements in its building codes — and widespread public disaster awareness appeared to have staved off a more serious catastrophe in April’s major quake.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Debris surrounds a tilted building a day after a powerful earthquake struck, in Hualien City, eastern Taiwan, on April 4, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Rescuers searched for dozens of people out of contact on April 4, a day after Taiwan’s strongest earthquake in a quarter century damaged buildings, caused multiple rockslides and killed nine people.

In the eastern coastal city of Hualien near the epicentre, workers used an excavator to put construction materials around the base of a damaged building to stabilise it and prevent a collapse. Mayor Hsu Chen-wei previously said 48 residential buildings were damaged. Some of the damaged buildings tilted at precarious angles with their ground floors crushed.

More than 1,000 people were injured in the quake that struck on Wednesday morning. Of the nine dead, at least four were struck inside Taroko National Park, a tourist attraction famous for its scenes of canyons and cliffs in Hualien County, about 150 km (90 miles) from the island’s capital Taipei.

“Nearly 150 people were either still trapped or out of contact on April 4,” the National Fire Agency said.

About two dozen tourists and some others were stranded in the park. The Health and Welfare Ministry said 64 others were workers at a rock quarry. Six workers from another quarry were airlifted from the area where access was cut off because roads were damaged by falling rocks.

Several people, including six university students, were also reported to be trapped. Around 50 people, mostly employees at the hotel earlier reported to be in the national park, were out of contact with authorities.

For hours after the quake, TV showed neighbours and rescue workers lifting residents through windows and onto the street from damaged buildings where the shaking had fused shut the doors. It wasn’t clear on Thursday morning if any people were trapped in the damaged buildings.

The temblor and aftershocks caused many landslides and damaged roads, bridges and tunnels. The national legislature and sections of Taipei’s main airport had minor damage.

Taiwan measured the initial quake’s strength as 7.2 magnitude while the U.S. Geological Survey put it at 7.4. The Central Weather Administration has recorded more than 300 aftershocks from Wednesday morning into Thursday.

Taiwan is regularly jolted by earthquakes and its population is among the best prepared for them. It also had stringent construction requirements to ensure buildings are quake-resistant.

The economic losses caused by the quake are still unclear. The self-ruled island is the leading manufacturer of the world’s most sophisticated computer chips and other high-technology items that are sensitive to seismic events.

Hualien was last struck by a deadly quake in 2018 that killed 17 people and brought down a historic hotel. Taiwan’s worst recent quake on September 21, 1999, a magnitude of 7.7 temblor, caused 2,400 deaths, injuring around 1,00,000 and destroying thousands of buildings.

New Delhi:

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday expressed anguish at the loss of lives in an earthquake in Taiwan, conveying India’s solidarity with the “resilient” people of the country.

He said on X, “Deeply saddened by the loss of lives due to earthquakes in Taiwan today. Our heartfelt condolences to the bereaved families and wishes for a speedy recovery to the injured. We stand in solidarity with the resilient people of Taiwan as they endure the aftermath and recover from it.” The strongest earthquake in a quarter-century rocked Taiwan during the morning rush hour on Wednesday, killing nine people, trapping dozens of miners and sending some residents scrambling out the windows of damaged buildings.

Deeply saddened by the loss of lives due to earthquakes in Taiwan today. Our heartfelt condolences to the bereaved families and wishes for a speedy recovery to the injured. We stand in solidarity with the resilient people of Taiwan as they endure the aftermath and recover from…

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) April 3, 2024

The quake, which also injured hundreds, was centred off the coast of rural, mountainous Hualien County, where some buildings leaned at severe angles, their ground floors crushed.

Just over 150 km away in the capital of Taipei, tiles fell from older buildings, and schools evacuated their students to sports fields, equipping them with yellow safety helmets.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Taiwanese authorities lost contact with people after powerful quake downed phone networks

April 03, 2024 04:59 pm | Updated 08:38 pm IST – Taipei

Wu Chien-fu, director of Taipei’s Central Weather Administration’s Seismology Center, said the quake was the strongest since one of 7.6-magnitude struck in September 1999, killing around 2,400 people in the deadliest natural disaster in the island’s history.

Wednesday’s magnitude-7.4 quake hit just before 8:00 am local time (0000 GMT), with the United States Geological Survey (USGS) putting the epicentre 18 km south of Taiwan’s Hualien City, at a depth of 34.8 km.

Three people among a group of seven on an early-morning hike through the hills that surround the city were crushed to death by boulders loosened by the earthquake, officials said.

Separately, the drivers of a truck and a car died when their vehicles were hit by tumbling rocks, while another man died at a mine quarry.

The National Fire Agency did not immediately offer details on the other three deaths, but said all the fatalities had been in Hualien county, adding that 946 people had been injured without specifying how seriously.

Social media was awash with shared video and images from around the island of buildings swaying as the quake struck.

“It was shaking violently, the paintings on the wall, my TV and liquor cabinet fell,” one man in Hualien told broadcaster SET TV.

Dramatic images were shown on local TV of multi-storey structures in Hualien and elsewhere tilting after the quake ended, while a printing warehouse in New Taipei City crumbled.

The mayor there said more than 50 survivors had been successfully plucked from the ruins of the structure.

Local TV channels showed bulldozers clearing rocks along the main route to Hualien, a mountain-ringed coastal city of around 1,00,000 people that has been cut off by landslides.

The main roads leading to the city pass through an extensive series of strongly built tunnels — some of them kilometres long — and officials said dozens of people could be trapped in vehicles inside.

Dozens of miners were also out of reach at a quarry in Hualien.

“We must carefully check how many people are trapped and we must rescue them quickly,” president-elect and current Vice-President Lai Ching-te told reporters in Hualien.

Engineers were also working to repair the main railway track that runs south from the capital down the eastern seaboard, which had been cut off in several places.

Regional impact

In Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines, authorities initially issued tsunami warnings but by around 10:00 a.m. (0200 GMT), the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said the threat had “largely passed”.

In the Taiwanese capital, the metro briefly stopped running but resumed within an hour, while residents received warnings from their local borough chiefs to check for any gas leaks.

Across the Taiwan Strait, social media users in China’s eastern Fujian province and elsewhere said they also felt strong tremors.

Residents of Hong Kong also reported feeling the earthquake.

China, which claims self-ruled Taiwan as a renegade province, was “paying close attention” to the quake and “willing to provide disaster relief assistance”, state news agency Xinhua said.

Fabrication at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company — the world’s biggest chip maker — was briefly interrupted at some plants, a company official told AFP, while work at construction sites for new plants was halted for the day.