The powerful tremors that rocked Taiwan on Wednesday morning have damaged 125 buildings across the island, according to the National Fire Agency (NFA). About half of the damaged buildings are in Hualien County, near the epicenter of the earthquake, according to local officials.Four buildings in the county had partially collapsed, Hualien County Magistrate Hsu Chen-wei said at a news conference Wednesday.
Residents from three of the buildings have been safely evacuated, while search and rescue operations continue at the nine-storey Uranus Building, which is leaning to the right after the ground floor collapsed, Hsu said.Twenty-two people have been rescued from the Uranus Building, with efforts still underway to contact one remaining resident, according to the National Fire Agency.Three of the four people who died after the most powerful earthquake in 25 years hit Taiwan were hiking in Taroko Gorge, a popular tourist destination, according to the National Fire Agency (NFA).
The three people were struck by fallen rocks while hiking the Dekalun Trail in Taroko Gorge, a rugged marble-walled canyon famed for its raw natural beauty in Hualien County, the epicenter of the quake.The fourth victim was a truck driver who was hit by fallen rocks outside a tunnel on the Suhua Highway, a major highway winding along steep cliffs of Taiwan’s eastern coast that was severely damaged in the earthquake.A section of the road outside the tunnel where the driver was killed had collapsed, according to earlier reports by Taiwan’s television stations. The entire highway has been closed down following the quake.At least 77 people are trapped across Taiwan after a powerful earthquake struck the island’s eastern coast, according to the National Fire Agency (NFA).
Authorities did not elaborate on the condition of those trapped, but said that rescue operations were underway.The 7.4 magnitude quake has killed four people and injured more than 700 others, according to NFA. Of those injured, 132 are in Hualien County, near the epicenter of the quake, the agency added.Taiwan is regularly rocked by earthquakes due to its location on the Pacific Ring of Fire.That’s where the world’s most active volcanoes lie. It’s also where most earthquakes happen as tectonic plates push against each other, causing sudden releases of energy that result in tremors.
The “ring” stretches along a 25,000-mile (40,000-kilometer) arc from the boundary of the Pacific Plate, to smaller plates such as the Philippine Sea plate, to the Cocos and Nazca Plates that line the edge of the Pacific Ocean.People most at risk from volcanic eruptions and earthquakes live in places that lie along the Ring of Fire, including Chile, Japan, the US west coast, and other island nations including the Solomon Islands to the western seaboard of North and South Americas.