7 dead and 730 injured in the strongest earthquake in 25 years to hit Taiwan

Taiwan earthquake: The magnitude of the earthquake reached 7.4, according to the US Geological Survey.

Tokyo:

At least seven people were killed and about 730 others were injured on Wednesday as a result of a strong earthquake that struck Taiwan, damaging dozens of buildings and leading to the issuance of tsunami warnings that extended to Japan and the Philippines before they were lifted.

Officials said the earthquake was the strongest to shake the island in decades, and they warned of more earthquakes in the coming days.

“The earthquake is close to the ground and is superficial. It was felt all over Taiwan and the offshore islands,” said Wu Xinfu, director of the Seismology Center of the Central Weather Administration in Taipei.

Strict building regulations and disaster awareness appear to have prevented a major disaster on the island, which is regularly hit by earthquakes because it is located near the intersection of tectonic plates.

Wu said that the earthquake was the strongest since it occurred in September 1999 with a magnitude of 7.6 and killed about 2,400 people in the worst natural disaster in the island's history.

Wednesday's 7.4-magnitude earthquake occurred just before 8:00 a.m. local time (0000 GMT), and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) located the epicenter 18 kilometers (11 miles) south of the city of Hualien in Taiwan, at a depth of 34.8 kilometers.

Officials said that three people out of a group of seven who were hiking early in the morning through the hills surrounding the city were crushed to death by rocks loosened by the quake.

In a separate incident, a truck driver was killed when his vehicle suffered a landslide while approaching a tunnel in the area.

Social media was full of videos and photos shared from across the country of buildings swaying as the earthquake struck.

Kelvin Huang, a hotel guest in the capital, Taipei, who took refuge in the elevator lobby on the ninth floor, said: “I wanted to run outside, but I did not get dressed. It was very strong.”

Local television showed dramatic images of multi-storey buildings in Hualien and other places tilted after the typhoon ended, while a warehouse collapsed in New Taipei City.

Local TV channels showed bulldozers removing rocks along roads leading to Hualien, a mountain-ringed coastal city of about 100,000 people that has been isolated by landslides.

President Tsai Ing-wen called on local and central government agencies to coordinate with each other, and said the national army would also provide support.

The National Fire Agency confirmed the death toll, adding that nearly 60 people were treated for quake-related injuries.

– Regional impact – In Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines, authorities initially issued a tsunami warning, but by 10 a.m. (0200 GMT), the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said the threat had “largely passed.”

In the capital, the subway briefly stopped operating but resumed within an hour, while residents received warnings from local district chiefs to check for any gas leaks.

Taiwan is regularly exposed to earthquakes, as the island is located near the intersection of tectonic plates, while neighboring Japan is exposed to about 1,500 tremors every year.

Across the Taiwan Strait, social media users in eastern China's Fujian province, which borders Guangdong in the south, and elsewhere said they also felt strong tremors.

Hong Kong residents also reported feeling the earthquake.

China, which claims self-ruled Taiwan as a breakaway province, is “paying close attention” to the quake and “is willing to provide disaster relief aid,” Xinhua news agency said.

A company official told AFP that manufacturing at the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company – the world's largest chip maker – was halted briefly at some factories, while work at new factory construction sites was halted throughout the day.

The vast majority of earthquakes around the region are mild, although the damage they cause varies depending on the depth and location of the epicenter below the Earth's surface.

The intensity of tsunamis – a vast, destructive series of waves that can move at hundreds of kilometers per hour – also depends on multiple factors.

The largest earthquake Japan has ever witnessed was a massive 9-magnitude undersea earthquake that occurred in March 2011 off the northeastern coast of Japan, triggering a tsunami that left about 18,500 dead and missing.

The 2011 disaster also led to the collapse of three reactors at the Fukushima nuclear plant, causing Japan's worst post-war disaster and the most serious nuclear accident since Chernobyl.

Japan experienced a major earthquake on New Year's Day this year, when a 7.5-magnitude earthquake struck the Noto Peninsula and killed more than 230 people, many of them when ancient buildings collapsed.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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