News Mania Desk /Piyal Chatterjee/ 1st October 2024
Taiwan, which is preparing for a storm surge, mobilized up to 40,000 troops on Tuesday to be on standby for rescue operations as strong Typhoon Krathon approached its heavily populated southwest coast.
Helicopters evacuated 19 sailors who were forced to abandon ship when it began to take on water as the typhoon neared.A train route was halted, some flights were canceled, and in Kaohsiung, a major port city, businesses closed and the streets were largely empty.
Typhoons frequently strike Taiwan, however they usually make landfall on the island’s flat western plain rather than the island’s mountainous and thinly populated east coast that faces the Pacific.
Around 2.7 million people live in Kaohsiung, which proclaimed a holiday and advised residents to stay indoors as super typhoon Krathon neared, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center of the U.S. Navy. The storm has achieved its peak intensity, according to Li Meng-hsiang, a forecaster with Taiwan’s Central Weather Administration. She warned of gusts exceeding 150 kph (93 mph) in the southwest and said the storm may diminish somewhat as it approaches Taiwan.
“The storm surge might bring tides inland,” Li said. “If it’s raining heavily it will make it difficult to discharge waters and as a result coastal areas will be subject to flooding.”
The world’s largest contract chip manufacturer, TSMC (2330.TW), which is a major supplier to Apple (AAPL.O), and Nvidia (NVDA.O), which has a sizable factory in the neighboring city of Tainan, have both activated routine typhoon preparations and do not anticipate a significant impact on their operations.
“After the typhoon, the whole of Kaohsiung was without water and electricity, just like a war,” Chen said, recalling the decades-ago destruction. “As much as possible, limit going out.”
