Magnitude 7.4 earthquake strikes Taiwan: 16 killed, over 1,100 injured - Aftershock mag 6.4 (UPDATED)

RT.com
Wed, 03 Apr 2024 02:40 UTC

The island was hit by the strongest tremors in 25 years, its chief seismologist said

© TVBS / AP

A partially collapsed building in Hualien, Taiwan on April 3, 2024.

A magnitude 7.2 earthquake struck off the eastern coast of Taiwan on Wednesday morning, damaging buildings and triggering a tsunami warning.

The earthquake struck off the coast of Hualien Country at 7:58 am local time and was felt across the island, including its capital Taipei, officials said.

Wu Chien-fu, the head of Central Weather Administration's Seismological Center, said it was the strongest earthquake to hit Taiwan since 1999. Despite its power, no casualties have been immediately reported.

Several tall buildings have partially collapsed. In other regions, the earthquake has triggered landslides.

Videos posted to social media show multi-story buildings dangerously leaning to one side.

Work and school classes were suspended in Hualien, as were high-speed rail services in several cities.

Tsunami alerts were issued for southern Japan and the northern areas of the Philippines. The Naha Airport on Japan's Okinawa has suspended all flights.

Comment: Updates

NBC News reports:

A 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck Wednesday off Taiwan, killing nine people, injuring hundreds and collapsing buildings in the island's most powerful tremor in at least 25 years.

The quake happened around 8 a.m. local time (8 p.m. Tuesday ET) at a depth of about 21 miles, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It was about 11 miles south-southwest of Hualien City on the island's east coast.

At least nine people died and 882 people were injured, Taiwan's fire department said. Officials said the number of casualties could rise in the coming days.

The earthquake also prompted tsunami warnings that were later lifted in Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines.

Annie Lima, an American who has lived in Taiwan for almost 17 years and arrived in Hualien to visit friends on Tuesday, said she was still feeling aftershocks in the afternoon, hours after the initial quake.

"It was pretty scary," she told NBC News in an interview. "In all the years that I've lived here and in Southern California before that I've felt a lot of earthquakes, but this was by far the strongest and the most frightening."

When things started toppling, Lima said, she and her husband jumped to their feet and ran for the nearest doorway.

"Even there in a doorway on the second floor, we could barely keep our balance, you know, holding both sides of the doorway," she said. "And all around us things were falling off the walls and off shelves, smashing and crashing everywhere."

The damage was concentrated in the eastern Taiwan county of Hualien, near the quake's epicenter, where officials said they were working to free 131 people who were trapped.

Video on social media showed a building in Hualien that appeared to be nine stories tall partially collapsed and left standing at an angle. Another, appearing to have five floors, was similarly situated.

Update April 10

AFP reports:

The toll from a massive earthquake that struck Taiwan last week rose to 16 on Wednesday after three more bodies were recovered on a hiking trail, officials said.

The magnitude 7.4 quake that hit the island on April 3 also left more than 1,100 people injured, with strict building codes and widespread disaster readiness credited with averting an even bigger catastrophe.

Authorities discovered the three victims Wednesday as they worked to retrieve two other bodies buried under the rocks along the Shakadang Trail in eastern Taiwan's Hualien county, the quake's epicenter.

The new fatalities brought the toll from the quake to 16, according to the National Fire Agency. Three people remain missing.

Earthquake Track reported an aftershock of magnitude 6.4 about 13 minutes later.