Mondo Taiwan - 11/08-12/11/99 - MONDO EARTHQUAKE

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

(MT) Saturday, December 11, 1999, 8:18 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - This one's weird. While this was reported by the Central Weather Bureau as being felt as a 1 in Taichung, it was felt as a 3 in Nantou, almost twice the distance from the epicenter. Here are the stats:

4:23 AM, 31.1 km NE of Taichung, magnitude 4.2, depth 21.6 km. View data here.
(MT) Thursday, December 9, 1999, 3:01 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau reported this quake in the northeast of Taiwan just after midnight this morning:

12:01 AM, 23.5 km SSW of Ilan, magnitude 4.9, depth 42.6 km. View data here.
(MT) Wednesday, December 8, 1999, 3:42 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau reported this early this morning:

5:22 AM, 37.9 km ENE of Tainan, magnitude 4.4, depth 15.9 km. View data here.
(MT) Wednesday, December 8, 1999, 1:37 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - The last two noteworthy tremors have appeared along the eastern coast of Taiwan. The Central Weather Bureau reported this Tuesday night:

5:34 PM, 17.9 km NNW of Hualien, magnitude 4.4, depth 15.2 km. View data here.
(MT) Tuesday, December 7, 1999, 4:05 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Wondering whether or not the shaking I felt a few minutes ago was in my imagination, I checked the Central Weather Bureau's website and found this:

2:14 AM, 26.5 km east of Ilan, magnitude 5, depth 101.1 km. View data here.

Despite its great depth and offshore location, it was felt in southern Ilan County as a 3. It certainly wasn't what I felt a few minutes ago. Perhaps I've had too much caffeine this morning.
(MT) Saturday, December 4, 1999, 12:27 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Three quakes near Chiayi were reported by the Central Weather Bureau on Friday:

11:49 AM, 1 km ESE of Chiayi, magnitude 3.8, depth 12.2 km. Something is a little fishy with the info related to this quake. First, it's smaller than the 4.0 or greater normally reported. Second, the info about "local largest intensity" says Chiayi felt it as a 4. View data here.
7:43 PM, 2.4 km SSE of Chiayi, magnitude 4.1, depth 12.7 km. View data here.
10:57 PM, 6.2 km east of Chiayi, magnitude 4.5, depth 7.6 km. View data here.
(MT) Thursday, December 2, 1999, 11:27 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Another quake very close to Chiayi has been reported by the Central Weather Bureau this morning:

1:06 AM, 0.9 km NE of Chiayi, magnitude 4.6, depth 10.9 km. View data here.
(MT) Wednesday, December 1, 1999, 11:27 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau hasn't reported any new seismic activity today, but they seem to be in the process of updating their site. When I visited the English version of their quake report page, things seemed a bit out of order, so I tried their image directory. I got a "403 Access Forbidden" alert, so I tried the Chinese version. There, I found lots of interesting updates. One page includes ALL the noteworthy seismic activity starting at10:35 PM on 9/20/99 with a 4.4 quake near Alishan and continuing up through the latest quake report on 11/30. You can see that page for yourself here. It helps to have Chinese (Big-5) capabilities on your computer, but you may be able to manage without them if you've got the patience. (Using any of the "View data here" links below for reference will help.) The links on the right are to graphic files which contain Chinese text as part of the images. The ones on the left are to text files which will be of no use without Chinese capabilities. It may also help to know that in Taiwan, the year 1999 is often referred to as year 88, hence the "strange" dates you may see on the aforementioned site.

They've also got an 8 MB AVI file here which is an amazing computerized motion picture of the 101 seconds of seismic activity during the big quake on 9/21 showing how it spread itself across Taiwan. This file took more than 15 minutes to download from within Taiwan on a 33.6K modem, but it's awesome to watch. It may need a little explanation, though. The colors at the beginning of the movie show the magnitudes represented by those colors in the part of the movie with the map. The last frame of the movie appears to show the largest intensity felt at any time during the quake at any given location. The darkest blue shows the areas which experienced the quake with the greatest intensity. I have redone this file as an animated GIF which is much smaller (801 KB). View it in a new window by clicking here.
(MT) Tuesday, November 30, 1999, 7:15 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - One tremor has already been reported this morning by the Central Weather Bureau:

1:54 AM, 18.7 km NNW of Alishan, magnitude 4.8, depth 9.3 km. View data here.

According to recent news reports, there are still many victims of the 9/21 quake who are living in tents. The temperature has dropped several degrees in the last couple of days, and rain has accompanied the rather chilly weather.
(MT) Monday, November 29, 1999, 3:26 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - The fourth notable tremor of the day was reported this morning by the Central Weather Bureau:

7:45 AM, 32.2 km southSSW (sic) of Chupei (northern Hsinchu County), magnitude 4.5, depth 1.1 km. View data here.

Perhaps it's just my nature to complain, but Chupei is in the northern part of the county north of this tremor's epicenter. Placing it in relation to Miaoli (about 15 km ESE of that city) would make more sense to me. I still haven't seen anything on the TV news about any of these quakes. I hope this means there were no serious problems as a result.
(MT) Monday, November 29, 1999, 6:00 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Two more even bigger tremors in the vicinity of Jade Mountain (Yushan) have already been reported by the Central Weather Bureau this morning:

4:42 AM, 18.7 km SSW of Yushan, magnitude 5, depth 2.5 km. View data here.
5:25 AM, 18.3 km SSW of Yushan, magnitude 5.1, depth 2.5 km. View data here.

I'll report more info as I get it.
(MT) Monday, November 29, 1999, 3:21 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau has reported one tremor this morning:

12:07 AM, 10.8 km east of Chiayi, 4.5, depth 6 km. View data here.

Same stuff, different day.
(MT) Sunday, November 28, 1999, 3:06 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - After a nearly 5-day respite from any noteworthy seismic activity, the Central Weather Bureau reports one tremor this morning:

4:36 AM, 22.5 km southSSW (sic) of Taichung, 4.2, depth 9.5 km. View data here.

The saga continues.
(MT) Tuesday, November 23, 1999, 3:41 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau has reported 2 noteworthy tremors so far today:

6:47 AM, 4.5 km NE of Chiayi, 4.3. View data here.
12:13 PM, 1.5 km east of Chiayi, 4.1. View data here.
(MT) Monday, November 22, 1999, 2:06 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Another noteworthy tremor struck a short time ago near Taichung, according to the Central Weather Bureau:

1:35 AM, 14.5 km southSSW (sic) of Taichung, 4.1. View data here.

Occurring at a depth of 13.6 km, it was said to be felt in Taichung City as only a magnitude-2 quake. I may have felt it and thought it was only my imagination, but it wasn't distinct like the one that happened Saturday morning.
(MT) Sunday, November 21, 1999, 12:24 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Today marks the passing of two months since the 9/21 earthquake, yet sizeable tremors are still affecting the island. In the past week alone, there was one tremor measuring 5.2 near Taichung, another 5.2 and a 4.9 in Chiayi, a 4.7 near Taichung just yesterday morning, and three others in Chiayi measuring 4.6. While no noteworthy damage to buildings or loss of life has been reported as a result, the unseen psychological damage exists nonetheless. With the recent large quake in Turkey, the fear has resurfaced in many people that another large quake could hit Taiwan.

With all the recent seismic activity in Taiwan, Turkey, Greece, and California, fuel is being added to the fire of those millennialist freaks who would like you to believe that these are signs of the impending end of the world. If you believe in that garbage, you may wish to note that despite all the media hype on the subject, the "new millennium" is still more than 13 months away. That's right. I've got to add my small voice to this news-selling mêlée. The new millennium begins on January 1, 2001--not 2000. Yes, I'm telling you that billions of flies can be wrong. Don't eat that stuff, and don't feed it to others!
(MT) Saturday, November 20, 1999, 11:38 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - A tremor lasting only about 1 or 2 seconds shook me just after I got up today. Here's the report from the Central Weather Bureau:

11:29 AM, 14.6 km SSW of Taichung, 4.7. View data here.
(MT) Friday, November 19, 1999, 3:58 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Today's quake reports from the Central Weather Bureau:

2:25 PM, 12.5 km SSW of Taichung, 4.3. View data here.
6:14 PM, 5.6 km NE of Chiayi, 4.1. View data here.

More screw-ups from the CWB. This last one wasn't listed on the page of quake reports. I had to do some digging in their image files to find it.
(MT) Thursday, November 18, 1999, 1:33 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - I have no word or injuries or damage from Wednesday afternoon's 5.2 quake near Taichung. People who wish to view the Leonid meteor shower early this morning are being warned to stay away from places like Alishan where the threat of landslides along the narrow mountain roads is still very real.

Two more quake reports from the Central Weather Bureau:

11:59 PM Wednesday, 17.9 km SSE of Taichung, 3.7. View data here.

As in the report by the Central Weather Bureau of a 3.8 quake in Chiayi on 11/8 (and here on this site on 11/9), this is smaller than the quakes with a magnitude of 4.0 or greater that are usually reported.

12:45 AM Thursday, 7 km east of Chiayi, 4.1. View data here.

Something else is amiss about the information. This quake and the one just before midnight are both numbered "274."
(MT) Wednesday, November 17, 1999, 3:53 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Another quake just shook me pretty strongly. TVBS-News reports it as having a magnitude of 5.2. The Central Weather Bureau reports this info:

3:35 PM, 14.8 km SSW of Taichung, 5.2. View data here.

The TVBS-N report lasted a mere 10 seconds or so--about half the duration of the quake. I'll update tonight with any new info I receive.
(MT) Tuesday, November 16, 1999, 3:42 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau has reported three more noteworthy tremors in Chiayi today:

2:10 AM, 4.2 km NE of Chiayi, 4.9. View data here.
3:56 AM, 6.5 km ESE of Chiayi, 4.3. View data here.
1:18 PM, 9 km east of Chiayi, 4.6. View data here.
(MT) Monday, November 15, 1999, 11:28 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - Four tremors in Chiayi today, according to the Central Weather Bureau:

3:25 PM, 8.8 km east of Chiayi, 5.2. View data here.
3:36 PM, 10.5 km east of Chiayi, 4.6. View data here.
6:56 PM, 8.9 km east of Chiayi, 4.6. View data here.
7:40 PM, 6.2 km east of Chiayi, 4.2. View data here.
(MT) Monday, November 15, 1999, 2:09 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Back from my arduous "vacation," the Central Weather Bureau has posted 3 new quake reports since my departure.

On Friday, November 12, 1999:
9:09 AM, 5.2 km ENE of Chiayi, 4.9. View data here.
8:25 PM, 2.2 km NNE of Chiayi, 4.2. View data here.

On Saturday, November 13, 1999:
8:18 PM, 16 km SW of Taichung, 4.6. View data here.
(MT) Thursday, November 11, 1999, 11:42 PM, Taichung, Taiwan - The Central Weather Bureau's quake reports for today:

7:32 AM, 17.8 km NNE of Sun Moon Lake, 4.3. View data here.
11:25 PM, 34 km ENE of Tainan, 4.5. View data here.

Don't panic if I don't update for a couple of days. I may be taking a trip this weekend. Stay safe!
(MT) Thursday, November 11, 1999, 4:57 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - According to the Central Weather Bureau and several people I know, a sharp shock hit very close to Taichung Wednesday morning:

8:30 AM, 14.3 km SSW of Taichung, 4.7. View data here.

There have been no reports of damage or injury that I know of. Fortunately, I slept through the tremor, but the "shaky feeling" has still not completely left me. I just noticed new hairline cracks in my walls on Monday, and that certainly doesn't provide me with a feeling of security.
(MT) Wednesday, November 10, 1999, 2:15 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Tuesday's only earthquake report from the Central Weather Bureau:

5:16 AM, 8.8 km northNNE (sic) of Alishan, 4.4. View data here.
(MT) Tuesday, November 9, 1999, 12:11 AM, Taichung, Taiwan - Usually, the Central Weather Bureau (as far as I can tell) has only been posting quake reports on those with a magnitude of 4.0 or greater. However, on Monday evening, this was posted:

5:50 PM, 2 km NW of Chiayi, 3.8. View data in English here or in Chinese here.

I don't know what this could signify if it's on purpose, but I do know that the tremors are growing fewer and farther between recently. Initial reports after the 9/21 earthquake said that aftershocks might continue for 2 months, and we're coming pretty close to the 2-month mark.

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