Biblical Weather Over The Weekend In Asia, With Two Typhoons And An Earthquake

Where: Taiwan

August 10, 2009 at 9:29 AM | by JetSetCD | 0 Comments

After a punishing weekend of pummeling rain, landslides, flooding, and collapsing houses, Taiwan and The Philippines are licking their wounds and counting the dead resulting from being hit by Typhoon Morakot.

The collapsed six-story Taiwan hotel in the picture above, whose 300 guests were all successfully evacuated, ended up collapsing into the floor waters, and it's no wonder with some southern cities getting dumped on by over 80 inches of rain. Before Morakot—which means "Emerald" in Thai— made landfall on Taiwan, it first killed 21 people in The Philippines. Among the dead were two Belgian tourists and a French tourist.

Sunday saw the storm rapidly loosing veracity as it headed onto China's mainland, where over 1 million people had already fled from the expected brutal weather. Morakot was soon downgraded to a tropical storm, but with 74-mile-an-hour winds and a trajectory towards Shanghai, it remains deadly.

In news unrelated to Typhoon Morakot but just as tragic, a separate typhoon—Typhoon Etau— hit Japan and killed nine people, followed by a 6.9-magnitude earthquake in Tokyo and eastern Japan. This was not at all a pleasant weekend to be in Asia.

Related Stories:
· Nearly 1 million flee typhoon in China [LA Times]
· Typhoon Pummels China and Taiwan [NYT]
· City prepares for gale and bucketing rain [Shanghai Daily]
· Travel Storms Coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Guardian UK/Reuters]

Jaunted

Select a Destination:

Tags: Weather Hell / Travel Storms / Travel Weather / Taiwan Travel / Phillipines Travel / → All Tags