Taipei – A strong earthquake shook much of Taiwan on Sunday, collapsing a three-story building, temporarily trapping four people inside, leaving about 400 tourists stranded on a mountainside, and part of a passenger train. has gone off track.
The magnitude-6.8 quake was the largest in dozens of quakes to rock the island’s southeast coast since Saturday evening. A 6.4 earthquake hit the same area. There were no immediate reports of serious injuries.
According to Taiwan’s Central Weather Service, most of the damage was north of the epicenter, at a relatively shallow depth of 7 kilometers (4 miles) in the city of Chishang.
According to the island’s central news agency, a three-story building with a 7-Eleven convenience store on the first floor and a residence on the second floor collapsed in the nearby town of Tamari.
The building’s 70-year-old owner and his wife were the first to be rescued, but it took a while to get to the 39-year-old woman and her 5-year-old daughter.
A photo released by the Hualien city government showed the girl lying on a blanket as rescue workers in orange uniforms and helmets lowered a metal ladder over the rubble.
The top two floors of the building were sprawled across a small street on the other side, with power lines pulled down by the collapsed building.
More than 7,000 households in Yuli lost power and water pipes were also damaged.
Police and firefighters rushed to the collapse of a bridge on a two-lane road, believed to be in the rural part of the same town, where three people and one or more vehicles may have fallen, according to media reports.
Also in Yuli, nearly 400 tourists were stranded in landslides on a mountain famous for the orange daylilies that cover its slopes this time of year, the Central News Agency said. They had no electricity and weak cell phone signals.
Debris from a canopy that fell onto the platform of Dongli station in the town of Fuli, between the cities of Yuli and Chishang, hit a passing train, derailing six carriages, the central news agency said. citing the administration. None of the 20 passengers were injured.
The tremor was felt at the northern tip of the island in the capital Taipei. In the city of Taoyuan, west of Taipei and 210 kilometers (130 miles) north of the epicenter, a man was injured when a ceiling collapsed on his fifth floor at a sports center.
The Japan Meteorological Agency issued a tsunami warning for islands in southern Japan near Taiwan, but later lifted it.
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https://www.local10.com/news/world/2022/09/18/strong-taiwan-earthquake-traps-people-derails-train/ Strong Taiwan earthquake traps people, train derails