At least 400 people are feared dead after a typhoon triggered a mudslide that wiped out their village in Taiwan.
The storm dumped up to 80 inches over the weekend before moving on to China, where it forced the evacuation of nearly a million people along the east coast.
Earlier it had struck the Philippines, leaving at least 22 dead. Typhoon Morakot (Thai for emerald) has now been downgraded to a tropical storm.
A Taiwanese police chief said about 100 people had been rescued from yesterday’s mudslide in southern Shiao Lin village.
One of them, Lin Chien-chung, said he believed as many as 600 people were still buried by the mud. “The mudslide covered a large part of the village including a primary school and many homes,” he said. “A part of the mountain above us just fell on the village.”
The village was still cut off today, after floods destroyed a nearby bridge.
Taiwan’s official death toll from Morakot stands at 14. Another 51, not including the people in Shiao Lin, are listed as missing.
Morakot slammed into China’s Fujian province yesterday afternoon carrying heavy rain and winds of more than 70mph, according to the China Meteorological Administration.
Hundreds of villages and towns were flooded and more than 2,000 houses had collapsed, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
In Japan, meanwhile, Typhoon Etau slammed into the west coast Monday. Twelve people were killed in raging floodwaters and landslides, and 10 others were missing, police said.
PA