Typhoon Doksuri: Flights cancelled, evacuations ordered in Philippines; China, Taiwan add alerts
The typhoon damaged several airports in northern Philippines
Manila: Typhoon Doksuri caused flooding, triggered landslides and cut power in the northern Philippines, where thousands remain stranded in ports or by roads blocked by debris, and authorities in China and Taiwan are preparing defenses against the storm.
Doksuri has maintained its strength with top, sustained winds of 175 kilometers per hour and gusts of up to 240 kmph, after making a second landfall over an island in northern Philippines, the weather bureau said in its 2 p.m. bulletin.
The storm is forecast to leave Philippine waters Thursday morning and cross the Taiwan Strait before hitting land again in Fujian, China on Friday, the bureau said.
Flights disrupted
The typhoon also damaged several airports in northern Philippines, including the Laoag gateway in Ilocos Norte, President Ferdinand Marcos's home province, CNN Philippines reported.
Nearly 50 domestic flights and four international flights, as well as many ferry lines, were cancelled, while railway services between eastern and southern Taiwan will be suspended from Wednesday evening.
More than 4,000 passengers were stranded at ports across the country after sea travel was suspended, the Philippine coast guard said. The storm is already disrupting travel outside of the Philippines.
In China, Xiamen Airlines canceled 32 flights scheduled for Thursday and Friday, state broadcaster CCTV reported.
Some train services linking densely populated cities such as Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Hangzhou near China's southern and eastern coasts were suspended.
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Thousands flee homes in Philippines
In the Philippines, the typhoon has so far affected more than 180,000 people in the Philippines, the Office of Civil Defense said Wednesday. Dozens of towns remain without electricity.
A woman selling bread rolls died when she was hit by a falling coconut tree in Ramon municipality in the northern province of Isabela on Wednesday, provincial disaster official Constante Foronda told AFP.
Dalupiri is one of the five islands that make up the tiny Babuyan archipelago.
Flooding has also been reported in the coastal municipalities of Lallo, Pamplona and Claveria. The Philippines is one of the most natural disaster-prone countries in the world. About 20 cyclones pass through the Southeast Asian nation each year, causing deaths and damage to agriculture, homes and infrastructure.
In October last year, more than 100 people died from floods and landslides triggered by storm Nalgae, which displaced hundreds of thousands of people in the Philippines.
Taiwan closes schools, office
Taiwan, which hasn't had a typhoon make landfall since 2019, announced school and office closures in various counties, including Hualien, Pingtung, Yilan and Kaohsiung.
More than 300 people were evacuated in southern and eastern Taiwan as a precaution as Doksuri was expected to bring up to 1 metre (3.3 feet) of rainfall.
There are emergency operation centers in 11 cities and counties, the Central News Agency reported, while alerts have been raised for both land and sea.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the main chipmaker for Apple Inc. and Nvidia Corp., and CPC Corp., which operates a massive LNG terminal, said they're taking precautions against the storm.
Red alert in China
Meanwhile, China's National Meteorological Center raised its alert on Doksuri to red, the highest of its four-tier color-coded system for severe weather. It said Doksuri is expected to make landfall in Fujian and Guangdong coastal areas on Friday morning.
Doksuri will remain a severe to super typhoon and gradually move towards the coastal areas of eastern Guangdong and southern Fujian of China Thursday and Friday, according to the Hong Kong Observatory. The Philippines has ceased referring to Doksuri as a super typhoon, and its weather bureau said the storm should gradually weaken.
Signal No. 1 to be issued in Hong Kong
Hong Kong will issue standby signal 1 on Wednesday night, the lowest on a scale of five. The government also warned that the city's air quality health risk index may reach "very high" or a "serious" level on Wednesday because of the storm.