YILAN, Taiwan: Five-meter waves pounded Taiwan’s shores Wednesday as Super Typhoon Kong-rey drew near, with forecasters expecting the storm to hit the island as one of the most powerful in years.
Kong-rey’s winds were sustaining maximum speeds of more than 230 kilometers (143 miles) per hour as it approached Taiwan, the US Joint Typhoon Warning Center said, slightly slower than an earlier reading. The storm was expected to unleash "destructive” winds when it made landfall in the lightly populated southeast on Thursday, the state weather forecaster, Central Weather Administration, said.
More than a meter of rain could fall in the hardest-hit areas by Friday as the seasonal monsoon also drenches the island of 23 million people, prompting warnings of landslides and evacuations of thousands of people from their homes in vulnerable areas.
Kong-rey was currently more powerful than the deadly Typhoon Gaemi, which was the strongest typhoon to hit Taiwan in eight years when it made landfall in July. "If (Kong-rey) keeps the current wind speed, it will be the biggest typhoon in eight years,” Chang Chun-yao from the state weather forecaster, Central Weather Administration, told AFP.
Classes and work were suspended in Taitung county where the typhoon looks set to make a direct hit, while dozens of ferry services and domestic flights were cancelled. Taipei residents planning to hunker down during the storm stocked up on fresh vegetables, while fishers wearing slickers against the rain tethered their boats in the harbour in Yilan county, southeast of the capital.
"Of course I’m worried. All my assets are here,” a fisherman, who gave his name as Captain Chen, told AFP. Kong-rey was expected to dump the heaviest rain on Taiwan’s eastern and northern coastal areas, and over the mountains in the central and southern regions, the Central Weather Administration said.
Yilan and the eastern county of Hualien were expected to be hardest hit, with accumulated rainfall from Tuesday to Friday reaching 800 to 1,200 millimeters (31-47 inches), forecaster Chang told AFP.
"Based on the projected path of the typhoon, we advise Yilan, Hualien and Taitung to take precautions against potential landslides and debris flows in areas expected to receive heavy rainfall,” Chang said.
Authorities began evacuating residents from their homes in the southern seaport city of Kaohsiung on Wednesday, as well as in Yilan, Hualien and Taitung, according to the National Fire Agency. More than 3,000 people have moved into emergency shelters in Hualien, the local government said. Soldiers in Yilan helped fill sandbags for residents to safeguard their properties against flooding. – AFP