2024-04-04 10:00:36
On Wednesday, Taiwan was hit by the strongest earthquake to hit the island in at least more than 25 years, resulting in deaths, the collapse of a large number of buildings, and issuing tsunami warnings.
The Taiwan Fire Department said that the earthquake killed at least four people and injured more than 50 others, while at least 26 buildings collapsed, most of them in the mountainous Hualien County in the east of the country.
Hualien is the epicenter of the earthquake that struck at approximately eight in the morning local time (midnight GMT), according to Agence France-Presse.
The deaths were recorded in Hualien, 3 of the victims died on a hiking trail, and the fourth died in a highway tunnel.
The Central Weather Administration in Taiwan said that the earthquake occurred at a depth of 15.5 kilometers off the island’s eastern coast.
Video clips showed terrifying footage of what the earthquake caused in residential buildings and streets, as Taiwanese television stations showed footage of severely tilted buildings in Hualien, while people were on their way to work and schools.
Reuters quoted Zhang Yulin (60 years old), a hospital worker in Taipei, as saying: “The earthquake was very strong. “I felt like the house was about to collapse.”
Meanwhile, the Pacific Tsunami Early Warning Center announced on Wednesday that the risk of high tsunami waves resulting from the violent earthquake had “largely ended.”
But at the same time, the center called on residents of coastal areas to remain alert, according to Agence France-Presse.
The earthquake led to warnings being issued in Japan, the Philippines and Taiwan about the risk of a tsunami, but Tokyo reduced the warning level to simple, while Manila canceled it completely.
Taiwan is an island prone to earthquakes, and its residents are accustomed to frequent earthquakes.
The official Taiwan Central News Agency said that this is the strongest earthquake to hit the island since 1999, when the last earthquake with a magnitude of 7.6 killed about 2,400 people, and completely or partially destroyed 50,000 buildings, in one of the worst earthquakes recorded in Taiwan.
Last updated: April 3, 2024 – 23:04
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2024-04-04 10:00:36