A “true monsoon” is on its way this weekend, Water Resources Agency Deputy Director-General Wang Yi-feng (王藝峰) said yesterday, citing Central Weather Bureau predictions.
There has been some precipitation in Taiwan over the past week, adding about 19 million tonnes of water combined to reservoirs across the nation.
However the rain so far has been from “summer storms” that do not compare in magnitude to a true monsoon, Wang said.
Photo: Wu Chun-feng, Taipei Times
“The rains that fell in the past week account for about two days’ use on average,” he said.
“As the plum rain season lasts from May to June, we have gotten into the habit of calling all rainfall in that period ‘monsoon rain,’ but a true monsoon is a specific meteorological phenomenon that is far more powerful and sustained than summer storms,” he said.
If this weekend’s plum rain sweeps over Taiwan at the right angle, it is capable of filling all of Taiwan’s reservoirs in just one weekend, he said.
“This is what is unique about Taiwan’s water supply, and we are reliant on monsoons and typhoons, but one good rain event can make a huge difference,” he said.
The weekend’s weather might even be in time to rescue parched Hsinchu County from going into additional water restrictions, Wang said.
“The county needs 100mm of rain before the end of the month, or it will shift from an ‘orange’ to a ‘red’ alert on Tuesday next week,” he said.
“So far this month, only 9mm of rain has fallen in the county,” he added.
It would be “no problem” for the monsoon to boost that to 100mm, Wang said.
Like many island nations, Taiwan’s water shortages have more to do with preserving rainfall than not enough falling, he said, adding that more reservoirs would help.
However, high-intensity rainfall causes rapid river currents that rush water into the ocean, so better soil conservation would also help retain more water, he said.
After no typhoons made landfall in Taiwan last year and a “dry monsoon” so far this year, all of western Taiwan is under some form of water restriction.
Taichung, Miaoli County and northern Changhua County are under a “red” alert, meaning that the agency provides households and businesses with water for five days per week.
Hsinchu is under an “orange” alert, with round-the-clock water pressure reductions and 15 percent mandatory water usage reduction for industrial users.
Two US House of Representatives committees yesterday condemned China’s attempt to orchestrate a crash involving Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim’s (蕭美琴) car when she visited the Czech Republic last year as vice president-elect. Czech local media in March last year reported that a Chinese diplomat had run a red light while following Hsiao’s car from the airport, and Czech intelligence last week told local media that Chinese diplomats and agents had also planned to stage a demonstrative car collision. Hsiao on Saturday shared a Reuters news report on the incident through her account on social media platform X and wrote: “I
‘BUILDING PARTNERSHIPS’: The US military’s aim is to continue to make any potential Chinese invasion more difficult than it already is, US General Ronald Clark said The likelihood of China invading Taiwan without contest is “very, very small” because the Taiwan Strait is under constant surveillance by multiple countries, a US general has said. General Ronald Clark, commanding officer of US Army Pacific (USARPAC), the US Army’s largest service component command, made the remarks during a dialogue hosted on Friday by Washington-based think tank the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Asked by the event host what the Chinese military has learned from its US counterpart over the years, Clark said that the first lesson is that the skill and will of US service members are “unmatched.” The second
STANDING TOGETHER: Amid China’s increasingly aggressive activities, nations must join forces in detecting and dealing with incursions, a Taiwanese official said Two senior Philippine officials and one former official yesterday attended the Taiwan International Ocean Forum in Taipei, the first high-level visit since the Philippines in April lifted a ban on such travel to Taiwan. The Ocean Affairs Council hosted the two-day event at the National Taiwan University Hospital International Convention Center. Philippine Navy spokesman Rear Admiral Roy Vincent Trinidad, Coast Guard spokesman Grand Commodore Jay Tarriela and former Philippine Presidential Communications Office assistant secretary Michel del Rosario participated in the forum. More than 100 officials, experts and entrepreneurs from 15 nations participated in the forum, which included discussions on countering China’s hybrid warfare
MORE DEMOCRACY: The only solution to Taiwan’s current democratic issues involves more democracy, including Constitutional Court rulings and citizens exercising their civil rights , Lai said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is not the “motherland” of the Republic of China (ROC) and has never owned Taiwan, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday. The speech was the third in a series of 10 that Lai is scheduled to deliver across Taiwan. Taiwan is facing external threats from China, Lai said at a Lions Clubs International banquet in Hsinchu. For example, on June 21 the army detected 12 Chinese aircraft, eight of which entered Taiwanese waters, as well as six Chinese warships that remained in the waters around Taiwan, he said. Beyond military and political intimidation, Taiwan
RSS