The end of last week was full of rainy days as Typhoon Morakot approached the island of Taiwan. A typhoon is basically nothing more than a hurricane, just located on the Eastern Hemisphere... same thing, different location and therefore a different name. Morakot ended up hitting the island on Thursday night and schools were shut down all across the island, for both Friday and Saturday. Now the storm, as I experienced it, in Taichung (on the western side of the island and near the middle in terms of latitude) was not impressive at all. There has been a lot of rain and there were some strong winds on Friday. However, this is nothing out of the ordinary, we didn't lose power and while I stayed inside all day, there were some people out and about, not many, but a few.
It was a serious storm, but nothing I haven't seen before from living in New York or Boston. Based on the wind speed, it would have been classified as a level 1 hurricane back home. Nothing to shake a finger at, but nothing to get too worked up about either... not in Taichung any way.
The Typhoon was actually quite devastating. It was larger than the entire island of Taiwan and came from the South East -- heading North West. The East side of Taiwan was devastated as well as some places in the South. Since the center of Taiwan is so mountainous, that provided a great deal of protection for the East and the location I am in as well. With that said, most of the damage was due to flooding from intense rains. In one particular case some flooding rose up from a low level drainage path... and then eroded away the foundation of a building on one side. The building ended up collapsing on it's side.
The flooding was really serious in many places and caused a great deal of trouble. Some people did die, too. If you're interested in reading more about the typhoon just do a google search for Typhoon Morakot and you'll be sure to get the updates. Photos are available through the following link:
glad you're in a safe spot. i was a little worried when i saw it hit Taiwan
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