A magnitude 6.4 earthquake rattled the nation at 3:57am yesterday, killing at least 15 people and injuring hundreds.
Emergency personnel rushed to Tainan, which had the highest number of casualties after several buildings collapsed.
At press time, emergency workers were still trying to search for people who might be trapped inside the 17-story Weiguan Jinlong residential building in the city’s Yongkang District (永康), which was left lying on its side on Yongda Road, with twisted metal girders exposed and clouds of dust rising from the concrete debris.
Photo: Huang Chih-yuan, Taipei Times
Officials said there were 256 people registered as living in the complex comprising 96 apartments. However, it was not clear how many people were inside the building at the time of the quake. As of 9:30 pm, rescuers had pulled 167 people from the building, while 155 remained unaccounted for, according to family members.
At least 30 people were rescued earlier from another seven-story residential building.
Officials said that eight other buildings collapsed or were semi-collapsed, several of which were left leaning at alarming angles.
Photo courtesy of the Changhua County Fire Bureau
More than 400 people were injured, with over 60 hospitalized, across the city.
As of 8:30pm, the Central Emergency Operations Center said that among the 15 killed, 13 were found at the ruins of the Weiguan Jinlong apartment building, including a 10-day-old infant.
A water tower fell on a 56-year-old woman in Gueiren District (歸仁), and a man died after a cabinet fell on him.
Photo: David Chang, EPA
There were also reports of people injured by falling debris. One man in Yunlin County broke his leg trying to escape by jumping out of a second-floor window.
Most people were asleep when the earthquake struck.
“[The building] first started shaking horizontally, then up and down, then a big shake right to left,” said Tainan resident Lin Bao-gui, a secondhand car salesman whose cars were smashed when the residential complex across the street from him collapsed. “I stayed in my bed, but jumped up when I heard the big bang that was the sound of the building falling.”
Photo: Patrick Lin, Reuters
The quake was centered in Kaohsiung’s Meinong District (美濃), at a depth of 17km, the Central Weather Bureau said. The strongest tremors, which had an intensity of 6 on the 0-7 seismic scale, were felt in Yunlin County, the bureau said. Kaohsiung, Pingtung, Tainan and Chiayi reported intensity 5, while Taitung, Penghu, Changhua, Nantou and Taichung felt level 4.
Strong aftershocks, which were centered in Tainan, were felt hours after the initial quake.
According to the National Fire Agency, the quake left about 400,000 households without water nationwide. Power outages affected about 121,000 residences in Tainan and hundreds in Kaohsiung.
Photo: Gladys Tsai, AP
The government set up the Central Emergency Operations Center to coordinate relief efforts, sending helicopters as well as medical and rescue teams to the stricken areas.
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) promised an all-out effort to rescue those trapped in collapsed buildings and to help survivors.
Ministry of National Defense officials said military units in southern Taiwan had mobilized 810 personnel, 11 medical teams, 24 teams equipped with breathing detection devices and 38 vehicles to join the search-and-rescue efforts.
Helicopters from the Army Aviation and Special Forces Command, based in Gueiren District, carried out aerial surveys, assisting ground crews in identifying priority disaster-relief zones and assessing damage, the ministry said.
The main defense troop detachment for southern Taiwan, the 8th Army Command, has also set up a joint military operations command center in Tainan to coordinate medical and rescue operations by various military units, it said.
Lieutenant General Chi Lien-cheng (季連成), who heads the 8th Army Command based in Kaohsiung’s Cishan District (旗山), said the army’s 54th Engineering Corps had deployed crane lifts and other heavy machinery to set up flood lights, enabling rescuers to work through the night as they search for people trapped in buildings.
Six medical teams from the 8th Army Command, along with five medical teams from the Kaohsiung Armed Forces General Hospital, arrived in Tainan, where they set up mobile field hospitals.
Officials from the air force’s 433rd Tactical Fighter Wing, which is headquartered at the Tainan Air Base, said it has turned the base into a temporary shelter that can accommodate up to 1,400 people whose houses were damaged by the quake.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare said it had launched six regional emergency operations centers at 4am yesterday and asked all hospitals to report the latest disaster relief situation.
Although the quake was felt throughout the nation, the most severe disaster was centered in Tainan. The first 72 hours after the quake are critical for rescuing people trapped under collapsed buildings, the ministry said, adding that 26 of its hospitals are participating in the emergency relief and support efforts.
Emergency relief is mainly provided by Tainan Hospital and its Sinhua Branch, while psychological trauma treatment is provided by Jianan Mental Hospital. Other hospitals will provide standby support, it added.
A 24-hour care and consultation hotline (0926-560-713) has been set up at the Jianan Mental Hospital, the ministry said.
The ministry has also set up a toll-free 24-hour care hotline (0800-788-995) for disaster victims who need psychological support.
The Financial Supervisory Commission said it had tasked the Taiwan Residential Earthquake Insurance Fund with coordinating with emergency response efforts. The commission also advised affected residents to notify their insurers to have their properties assessed for damage to expedite processing of their compensation claims.
Additional reporting by Ted Chen
DEATH THREAT: A MAC official said that it has urged Beijing to avoid creating barriers that would impede exchanges across the Strait, but it continues to do so People should avoid unnecessary travel to China after Beijing issued 22 guidelines allowing its courts to try in absentia and sentence to death “Taiwan independence separatists,” the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday as it raised its travel alert for China, including Hong Kong and Macau, to “orange.” The guidelines published last week “severely threaten the personal safety of Taiwanese traveling to China, Hong Kong and Macau,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesman Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) told a news conference in Taipei. “Following a comprehensive assessment, the government considers it necessary to elevate the travel alert to orange from yellow,” Liang said. Beijing has
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday said that the Chinese Communist Party was planning and implementing “major” reforms, ahead of a political conclave that is expected to put economic recovery high on the agenda. Chinese policymakers have struggled to reignite growth since late 2022, when restrictions put in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic were lifted. The world’s second-largest economy is beset by a debt crisis in the property sector, persistently low consumption and high unemployment among young people. Policymakers “are planning and implementing major measures to further deepen reform in a comprehensive manner,” Xi said in a speech at the Great Hall
CIVIL DEFENSE: More reservists in alternative service would help establish a sound civil defense system for use in wartime and during natural disasters, Kuma Academy’s CEO said While a total of 120,000 reservists are expected to be called up for alternative reserve drills this year, compared with the 6,505 drilled last year, the number has been revised to 58,000 due to a postponed training date, Deputy Minster of the Interior Ma Shih-yuan (馬士元) said. In principle, the ministry still aims to call up 120,000 reservists for alternative reserve drills next year, he said, but the actual number would not be decided later until after this year’s evaluation. The increase follows a Legislative Yuan request that the Ministry of the Interior address low recruitment rates, which it made while reviewing
SOLUTIONS NEEDED: Taiwan must attract about 400,000 to 500,000 skilled foreign workers due to population decline, the minister of economic affairs said in Washington President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration is considering a plan to import labor to deal with an impending shortage of engineers and other highly skilled workers, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said in Washington on Tuesday. Kuo was leading a delegation attending the SelectUSA Investment Summit. Taiwan must attract about 400,000 to 500,000 skilled foreign workers for high-end manufacturing jobs by 2040, he said. Ministry of Economic Affairs officials are still calculating the precise number of workers that are needed, as it works on loosening immigration restrictions and creating incentives, Kuo said. Taiwanese firms operating factories in the US and other countries would