Mondo Taiwan - 9/22-9/26/99 - MONDO EARTHQUAKE -921 Taiwan Earthquake

<BGSOUND SRC="images/question.mid"> MONDO EARTHQUAKE

(MT) Sunday, September 26, 1999, 10:42 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Another "aftershock" measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale struck at about 8:00 this morning toppling more buildings and causing more deaths. It's been reported that ther have been "close to 6,300 aftershocks [Editor: that's about one every minute!], more than 60 classed as major quakes." This morning's tremor also cut the power for the whole day, so I haven't seen any of today's TV coverage yet. The power returned around 9:30 PM, but I was unable to get online for a couple of hours, and there's nothing on the TV but "snow."

I went downtown today to look for some of my friends and co-workers who are camping out in "Citizens' Square" with hundreds, if not thousands, of others. I was lucky to find 2 of them sitting in the dark as the power was still out in much of the area. They took me to a nearby location to have a look at something. As we walked down a small street with absolutely no lights, a strange vision appeared before us: a tall building lying on its side across the street in front of us! I was told it had fallen in one of the aftershocks within the last couple of days. We walked around to see it from another vantage point. Around the corner, we were able to see the top of the building. It was an incredibly eerie sight.

Meanwhile, Taiwan president Lee Teng-hui signed an emergency decree which could place disaster-stricken areas under martial law for the next 6 months. This would give the Taiwan government the power to seize private property such as homes or cars, the freedom to commandeer the entire water supply, and the right to go ahead with construction of new housing without worrying about such things as building codes and environmental impact assessments. Hopefully, this would speed the recovery process and allow temporary shelter to be provided for the multitudes of those who have suddenly become homeless. On the other hand, I don't think a lot of people have faith in the government to carry this out. Many of Taiwan's citizens have criticized the government in the aftermath of Tuesday's big quake for their slow response in declaring an emergency and in coordinating rescue efforts, shelters for victims, etc. (Read the China Post article here or the full text of the decree here.)

At Taipei's Sungshan hotel/apartment complex, 2 young men, 20-year old Sun Chi-kuang and his 25-year old brother Sun Chi-feng, were rescued after spending 130 hours trapped in the collapsed 12-story building. They said they survived by eating rotten apples and by drinking both dripping water that had been sprayed on the building by rescue workers as well as their own urine. The younger of the 2 brothers was able to walk out of the wreckage on his own after workers had smashed their way through the debris leaving him an escape route. The older Sun was soon dug out by rescuers and taken out on a stretcher. Workers had been using heavy machinery at that point because they had given up hope of finding anyone else alive. Afterwards, they resumed their slower method of removing debris by hand, bit by bit.

In more depressing news, Chang Yu-ching, the 4-month old sister of Chang Ching-hung, the 6-year old boy rescued on Friday, died leaving her brother as the sole survivor in the family. Both of the boy's parents and his other sister's dead bodies were pulled from the rubble on Friday.

The death toll was revised downward sometime within the past 24 hours due to the fact that Taichung and Nantou counties had both reported some of the same people as dead. Today's figures, compiled from the 3 English-language morning newspapers are as follows: deaths: 2,002; injuries: 8,544; trapped: 206; missing: 23; stranded: 1,787; homes completely destroyed: 6,400; homes partially collapsed: 5,600; banned from leaving the country: 13 Taichung building contractors and architects.
(MT) Saturday, September 25, 1999, 1:42 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Here are some current statistics according to this morning's newspapers: deaths: 2,189; injuries: 8,432; trapped: 291; missing: 33; stranded: 1,795(?); homeless: over 100,000 in Nantou County alone; rescued: 5 on Friday; arrested: 2 on Friday.

In addition to the rescue of 6-year old Chang Ching-hung and his 4-month old sister Chang Yu-ching, a woman in Changhua, just south of Taichung, was freed after spending 80 hours under "tons of steel and concrete," and an elderly couple in Nantou were gotten out after being trapped for an incredible 91 hours (3 days, 19 hours!). They must've done their t'ai chi every morning and been in really good shape! Good luck to all of them.

A businessman and an architect who were responsible for the construction of a collapsed building in the Hsinchuang suburb of Taipei were arrested after investigators learned that the building wasn't built according to the blueprints. Three other businessmen in Taichung County were banned from leaving the country because of alleged involvement in the construction of buildings that toppled in Tuesday's earthquake. Prosecutors are seeking to file manslaughter charges against these people and others involved in the construction of such buildings.

Worried about rain (I don't have a tent), I finally slept inside last night after I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer. A tropical depression in the South China Sea has been upgraded to a light typhoon named "Cam" which may bring heavy rain to the mountainous regions of central Taiwan. The temperature may also drop to about 20°C (68°F), causing concern about keeping warm for those who must sleep outdoors. The aftershocks have gotten smaller and farther between, so I've been able to relax a little. However, I don't know if the slight shaking that I constantly seem to feel is coming from inside or if they are actually small aftershocks.

(MT) Friday, September 24, 1999, 9:42 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Korean and Japanese rescuers around dusk dug a 6-year old boy who had been trapped for more than 80 hours out of the rubble of a building in Tali--a suburb of Taichung City. The boy, named Chang Ching-hung, was said to be okay, but a bit dehydrated. The squad leader said the boy just needed some "Pocari Sweat." A big thanks to the rescue team on that one! In related news (no pun intended), the boy's 4-month old sister, Chang Yu-ching, was also rescued at about 11:30 PM. More kudos to the rescuers.

Chang Ching-hung

Media hounds!

A big shit on the heads of the media who looked like they would crush the rescue team as they brought the boy to a waiting ambulance. In the picture at the left, you can see the rescue team in green helmets (4 people on the left) trying to load the boy into the ambulance (the barely visible white thing near the center of the image). Practically everyone else there is from the media.

In the photo at right, you can almost see the boy at the hospital as the media circus scrambles for a story.

The subtitle reads:
"(Tell everybody 'thank you' again.) [voice of the boy's aunt] Thank you everybody. [the boy]"

No rest for the weary, eh? Read a 10/2/99 Taipei Times editorial on the incredible, unethical tactics of reporters (with direct references to Chang Ching-hung) here or a 10/18/99 article on the public perception of the media's coverage of this tragedy here.

Give him a break!

(Friday, September 24, 1999 - cont'd) Another aftershock measuring 4.9 to 5.0 (according to various reports) struck just before noon today. The death toll is now at 2,131, and the number of injured is 8,137, while 68 people are still missing and another 4,192 are cut off from the rest of the world because of damaged roads or impassable debris. It is said that well over 100,000 people have been left homeless in the aftermath of Tuesday morning's quake.

Today is Mid-Autumn Moon Festival--a holiday which takes place on the 15th day of the 8th lunar month in the Chinese calendar. It's common on zhong qiu jié for people to have outdoor barbecues, eat "moon cakes," and shoot fireworks. Many people are still barbecuing, but they're only outside tonight because they don't have homes. Others are out because they're still afraid to enter their homes.

By the way, CNN picked up its lame coverage of the devastation this evening. I saw something about Tiananmen Square in their very propagandistic Visions of China series. I wondered if CNN could possibly be criticizing the Chinese government for the June 4, 1989 incident in which they murdered hundreds of demonstrating students. It amounted more to flag-waving than anything else. That's CNN (Chinese Nationalist News?) for ya.
(MT) Friday, September 24, 1999, 6:52 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - One of the biggest things in today's news is that according to CNN (China News Network?!), the earthquake is no longer news. Apparently CNN thinks it isn't profitable enough to carry further coverage of the quake on their fucked-up website. I'm beginning to wonder if they're actually run by the mainland Chinese government who can't stand the attention being directed toward Taiwan this week. CNN is still a running a propaganda series called Visions of China on their website every freaking day.

In "hard" news, the death toll has climbed to 2,109, although 9 survivors were found Wednesday. There have been 7,848 injuries reported. There are about 300 still trapped in rubble or simply missing and 5,557 people are cut off from the rest of civilization because of blocked or damaged roads. Another aftershock measuring 5.6 also struck the island late Thursday, again hampering rescue efforts.

A bulletin board site related to the quake is up at http://www.live.net.tw. Statistics, including victims' names, are available at http://www.live.net.tw/list.htm. Both of these pages are in Chinese Big-5 encoding.

Water and power will be rationed over the next 2 weeks (or more). Power availability will follow a complicated schedule, while the water supply in Taichung City and County will be on 2 days and off 4 days until the supply is restored.

The Taiwan government has cancelled National Day (October 10) celebrations in light of the earthquake relief efforts. It will be the first time in the 88 year history of the R.O.C. that Double Ten Day will pass without elaborate celebrations which usually include fireworks displays and an "ultraphallic" parade of military might. It's about time to dispense with such nonsense!

Better late than never? Liu Tai-han, the owner of Han Construction Company, was arrested due to evidence found in collapsed buildings built by his company. The walls were said to be "filled with empty plastic bottles and metal buckets instead of bricks." I told ya so!

For daily bilingual (English-Taiwanese) coverage of Taiwan-related news, check out the News by Monkey Boy link at the top of Monkey Boy's Taiwanese Language Page. (I haven't included a direct link because it changes.)
(MT) Thursday, September 23, 1999, 6:45 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - One of my friends lives in an area of Taichung County where a lot of people died. I've been trying for more than two days to contact her, but to no avail. Tonight's news showed a list of the names of people who have died thusfar as a result of Tuesday's earthquake. Through my tears, I struggled to read the names, hoping that my friend wasn't on the list. Of course, it was in Chinese, and I couldn't keep up, but I did see several people there with the same family name as my friend. It seemed to go on forever, but as soon as it finished, I tried once again to reach her. Someone answered the phone, and I could hardly speak. They asked me to hold on. When Jenny came to the phone, she was happy to hear my voice. I was the first person to call after her telephone was back in service. She told me that the mountain road that connects her to the city was out, so I might not see her for a while. I told her it was okay because she was alive and safe.
(MT) Thursday, September 23, 1999, Taichung, Taiwan - The death toll in Tuesday's earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale has risen above the 2,000 mark and is likely to rise further. There are more dead bodies than survivors being pulled from the rubble. Strong aftershocks, measuring up to 6.8, are slowing the rescue efforts. It is now more than 53 hours since the big one struck (1:47 AM, 9/21/99), so the likelihood of finding more survivors is dim.

Many people who still have places to stay, including myself, chose to sleep outside last night for fear of an even bigger quake hitting. Speculations abound that the 9/21 Chi Chi earthquake was not "the big one" and that a quake with a magnitude of 8.0 could possibly strike the island. As I've mentioned on the Mondo Taiwan - Architecture page, construction standards are pretty shitty here, and many of the buildings which collapsed in Tuesday morning's quake were recently-built high-rises.

What I did last night was to camp out in an open field near the Luce Chapel at nearby Tunghai University where nothing could fall on me. Now that it's daylight, I feel okay to be back inside. Well, I live on the first floor of a 7-story building, but I wouldn't want to be upstairs. I can be out the front door in less than 10 seconds, and I will be at the first vibration I feel.

There have been more than 2,000 aftershocks, most too small to even be felt. However, several have been major earthquakes in their own right--nine of them measuring at least 5.0 on the open-ended Richter scale.

Beware of CNN's coverage of this quake (or anyone's, for that matter--even mine!). CNN led their breaking coverage of this story by first mentioning "China's President Jiang Zemin" and his expression of condolences. CNN couldn't even get the spellings of city names correct, and they concentrated too much effort on Taipei, which--despite having a 12-story building which collapsed--has been spared a lot of the direct damage from the quake. What the China Post's Vera Tung reported as a "fallen billboard" was actually the collapsed bus station. I went there and took nearly the same photo that was printed in the paper. (Hope I can get to a scanner soon!)

I will bring you updates, corrections, and personal anecdotes as they become available--life and Internet connectivity permitting. Take care.
(MT) Wednesday, September 22, 1999, Taichung, Taiwan - At 1:47 AM on September 21, 1999, the island of Taiwan was struck by an earthquake measuring--according to various reports--between 7.3 and 7.6 on the Richter scale. It is said to be the strongest earthquake ever to have hit Taiwan since seismological activity has been measured. The epicenter was said to be in the small, rural town of Chi Chi, near Sun Moon Lake, but the effects were felt by the entire island of Taiwan as well as by outlying parts of Taiwan such as Orchid Island (Lanyu).

According to the 9/22/99 edition of the Taipei Times and a 9:35 AM report on Formosa Television News, there have been 1,712 fatalaties and 4,005 injuries as a result of the quake. More than 2,820 are believed to still be trapped in rubble with many others missing, according to ICRT's 10:00 PM 9/22 report. In addition, it has been reported by CNN that more than 100,000 people have been left without homes. Many who still have homes are without water and/or electricity.

Taichung County, where I live, has reported the highest death and injury toll (952 dead, 1,317 injured, according to the Taipei Times). The 9/22 edition of the Taiwan News reports that "Most of the buildings that collapsed were new high-rises. The region has experienced an explosion in development in recent years, and shoddy construction is a problem." The same article also says that a "12-story building of Yungchao ... sank into the ground, leaving only four stories above the surface." My goodness!

There have been several aftershocks, most of which have been quite small, but at at 8:14 and 8:49 AM on 9/22 (about an hour before I started typing this), there were 2 temblors lasting about 20 - 30 seconds each that shook me up more than just physically. The first of those measured 6.8 on the Richter scale while the second one hit the 6.1 mark. There was also a brief, but firm jolt at approximately 2:20 AM 9/22 that got me out of bed quickly. (The Taipei Times reports this one as being a 5.0 and occurring at 2:18 AM.)

Finally, I would like to extend my condolences to the families and friends of all those who were killed by this quake as well as to those survivors who received injuries.
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