Taiwan's Typhoon Morakot Douglas Habecker, August 14, 2009 |
Hi Everyone,
I don't know if you've been following the news out of Taiwan, but
this Typhoon Morakot disaster--now referred to as the "8-8 Flood
Disaster"--just keeps getting worse, after dumping the heaviest
rainfall on Taiwan in half a century--about 2.5 meters (9
feet). Coincidentally, the last storm this bad came
almost 50 years earlier to the day--Aug. 7, 1959 in what had
been referred to as the "8-7 flood disaster". Today,
President Ma Ying-jeou said that at least 500 people may be dead,
which isn't surprising, given the fact that hundreds of people are
unaccounted for in dozens of mountain towns and villages, from as
far north as Taoyuan but mainly in Nantou, Yunlin, Chiayi, Tainan,
Kaohsiung, Pingtung and Taitung counties. The attention
has focused on one Kaohsiung county village, Xiaolin, in
particularly, where about 160 homes were completely wiped out by two
mudslides that hit from opposite sides of a valley, leaving only 2
houses in the entire village standing. The valley is under
about five stories of mud now. In many places elsewhere, the
roads are completely gone, leaving places only accessible by
helicopter. One image being repeated on local news since
yesterday is a makeshift sign erected by cut-off villagers on the
far side of destroyed mountain bridge that simply reads
"32 dead. SOS". Even Alishan is completely cut off
and the Highway Bureau says it will be at least mid-October before
the road can be rebuilt. The southern link rail system between
Kaohsiung and Taitung will be down at least 5 months, they say.
Even in lower-lying towns where clean-up has begun, the task is
daunting with roads and homes alike filled with glue-like mud
and littered with piles of furniture, household possessions,
even buses, lying like discarded toys after being pushed there by
flood waters.
This really reminds me of the 9-21 earthquake in many ways, although
the storm has alread surpassed the quake in some ways--destroying
more bridges, for example (total at least 21). The whole
island is coming together to provide supplies, volunteers and relief
for victims and hard-hit areas. Still, everything's still a
bit chaotic and the government is being criticized for what is
perceived to be its slow and unorganized response. The
military has deployed thousands of soldiers and a lot of its
helicopters, but there don't seem to be enough, as so many
communities are without proper food and supplies. Air Force
Blackhawks, Army Hueys and Chinooks, and police choppers and
their crews have been working non-stop, dropping supplies and
evacuating people. The island has three posthumous heroes
after a National Airborne Services Corp Huey and its crew
crashed into a narrow mountain valley near a Rukai aboriginal
village, whose villagers gathered to hold a prayer service for the
men as their bodies were being recovered. The three veteran
crew members, who had previously won recognition for their work in
other disasters, had been working without much food or sleep in
the first desperate days of the storm when they went down. A
number of Aborigine rescue crew members and rangers are also being
praised for their extraordinary physical achievements and bravery in
reaching cut-off villages through near-impossible terrain.
Now, Taiwan is asking foreign countries for assistance,
including rescue teams and heavy-lift helicopters to get supplies
and earth-moving equipment into mountain areas. More mundane
things that are being asked for include chlorine tablets. It
will be interesting to see if anyone, such as the U.S.
government/military, responds. Singapore was the first nation
to come through with aid and Hong Kong just pledged US$50 million.
The disaster certainly is getting quite a bit of
international attention. CNN has a couple of their international
correspondents covering the story here and BBC is giving it a fair
amount of press. The local and international media have broadcast
a number of striking images, starting with the high-rise
hotel in Taitung's Chih-pen hot springs area toppling over into
a river. Much more human images show weeping relatives begging
rescuers to get their family members in mountain communities;
orphaned children who are the only survivors in their immediate
families; elderly men and women who have lost their homes and
everything. A teenaged boy begged his dead grandmother for
forgiveness--he was cooking her dinner when a wall of mud came
through one side of the house, leaving him to barely escape alive as
she was buried. One little elementary girl who has lost
everything said that the thing she hopes for the most is to be able
to go to school again (hers was destroyed). Some Taipei
schools have already said that they would be open for disaster
victim children, even as the government and NGOs try to figure out
housing for so many homeless. I think one of the most moving
images is that of a single man, standing alone on in the driving
rain on top of a lonely two-story police station in a mountain
valley that has been completely inundated by raging flood
waters for hundreds of meters around, with nothing and no one in
sight. Fortunately, the man--an Aborigine police officer--was
later plucked off the roof by a chopper.
If you're interested in finding more news, you can log onto the
Taipei Times or China Post websites, which are full of stories. Various
media websites (including CNN's) have links to a number of
international relief agencies that are accepting donations for this
disaster relief. Hopefully, the situation will improve
in the days and weeks ahead, but it will take many months, perhaps
years, before life returns to anything resembling normalcy for many
victims of Typhoon Morakot.
Doug
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Douglas Habecker is a journalist, living in Taichung,
Taiwan. He graduated from Morrison Academy in Taichung in 1985 and
received a degree in Journalism from Messiah College. He publishes
Compass Magazine, which is a "What's Happening" periodical for
the major cities of Taiwan. He also maintains the website, http://taiwanfun.com/
, which complements his magazine. Doug is the journalism teacher
at Morrison Academy. Active in Taichung affairs, Habecker has
served as consultant in various local government programs as well as to
foreign corporations doing business in the area.
Doug Habecker: doughabecker@yahoo.com |
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