BREAKING NEWS

Powerful storm hits Taiwan, millions without power, four dead

By REUTERS

AUGUST 8, 2015 09:35

TAIPEI/YILAN - A powerful typhoon battered Taiwan on Saturday with strong wind and torrential rain, cutting power to nearly 3 million households and killing four people.

By mid-day, as the eye of Typhoon Soudelor passed Taiwan, four people were missing and 64 injured and hundreds of flights delayed or cancelled, authorities said. More than 7,500 people have been evacuated.

The storm made landfall early in the morning on the island's east-coast counties of Yilan and Hualien, bringing up to 1,000 mm (39 inches) of rain in mountainous northeastern areas and wind gusting up to 200 kph (124 mph).

"This is one of the worst typhoons I have ever seen," said a sewage station engineer surnamed Jiang, who was inspecting pumping stations early on Saturday.

"My car was shaking when I was driving. There are too many trees down, and I even saw six downed power poles."

A rescue worker was killed by a passing car as he tried to clear downed branches from a road and a foreign worker died when he was hit by a falling sign, authorities said.

As the storm approached over the Pacific Ocean on Friday, a child and an adult were killed in rough seas off the coast of Yilan.

In the capital, Taipei, large steel sheets and rods were blown off a half-constructed stadium and city authorities shut down a growing number of bus and subway services.

Authorities issued flood and mudslide alerts and television showed a fallen wind turbine, mudslides trapping people, and flood nearly covering the roofs of cars in some areas.

More rain and wind has been forecast for late Saturday and Sunday.

Taiwan Power, the island's main power company, said 2.94 million households had lost power. While some supplies had been restored, two million households were still without power on Saturday afternoon, the company said.

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