Taiwan says 50 percent risk Tembin may return

TAITUNG: Taiwan forecasters warned yesterday that tropical storm Tembin could return early next week after triggering the worst downpour in over a century on the island's southernmost tip.
Tembin, initially graded a “severe” typhoon by the Hong Kong Observatory, swept across southern Taiwan on Friday before moving out to sea, where it was packing winds gusting up to 101 kilometers (63 miles) an hour.
“There is roughly a 50 percent risk Tembin could affect Taiwan again on Monday or Tuesday depending on its path,” said forecaster Lin Bin-yu, from Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau.
Tembin's course hinged partly on Typhoon Bolaven, which was not expected to head directly to Taiwan, he said. Bolaven is moving towards southern Japan and predicted to hit Okinawa today.
Tembin unleashed torrential rain in the southern Pingtung county that was described as the worst in more than a century.
Weather bureau data showed Pingtung as a whole received 724 millimeters (29 inches) of rain since Wednesday, while the township of Hengchun saw rainfall of over 600 millimeters on Friday alone.
“In Hengchun, it's a record amount of rainfall since 1896,” said Hsieh Ming-gung, a forecaster with the weather bureau. Hengchun has a population of about 30,000 and forms Taiwan's southernmost tip.
Television footage showed scenes from villages in Pingtung county, where pedestrians were walking through ankle-deep water, while workers removed debris left by flooding.
Young military conscripts walked from house to house to help residents put their homes back in order after they had been engulfed by mudflows, TV showed.
“Flooding in the Hengchun area Friday was very serious, and worse even than Morakot,” said Chen Cheng-chia, an official with the Pingtung Fire Agency, referring to a typhoon that struck Taiwan in August 2009, killing about 600.
The latest typhoon left five people injured in its path, including two firefighters, according to Taiwan's Central Emergency Operation Centre.
The Taiwanese government, which was criticized heavily for its perceived passivity when Morakot struck, put 50,000 soldiers on standby in order to ensure speedy rescue in case of a major disaster.
n FROM: Agence France Presse