Aftershocks are expected over the next two days following a magnitude 6.0 earthquake off the coast of Hualien County on Monday evening that jolted northern Taiwan, a Central Weather Bureau (CWB) official said.
Chen Kuo-chang (???), head of the CWB’s Seismological Center, said aftershocks ranging in magnitudes of 4 to 5 can be expected, but people should not be too overly concerned.
The temblor that occurred at 5:46 p.m. was caused by one tectonic plate thrusting beneath the other in a subduction zone, Chen said.
According to the CWB, the epicenter of the quake was located in waters off of Hualien County, 56.7 kilometers east of the Hualien County government complex, and hit at a depth of 19.4 km.
Though the earthquake strongly jolted several parts of northern Taiwan, it did little damage.
The National Fire Agency said it received two reports at around 5:50 p.m. of people being trapped in elevators in New Taipei’s Sanchong District, and another involving a vehicle that was hit by falling rocks on the Suhua Highway in Yilan County, but no one was injured.
Meanwhile, Taiwan’s three major science-based industrial parks continued to operate normally, and no damage has been reported.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said it was operating as normal while United Microelectronics Corp., also a chipmaker, said its production lines were not affected by the tremblor.
According to Taiwan Power Co., the country’s state-owned electricity supplier, 1,843 households temporarily lost power in the Taipei and New Taipei areas as a result of Monday’s quake.
The company said efforts are currently ongoing to restore electricity to 31 remaining households in Taipei’s Da’an District without power.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel