Climate and Natural Disasters

Cleanup Efforts Reach Outlying Village, Local Health Center in Flooded Hualien

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By Alex Chen/Irene Lin

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Volunteers are heading to outlying villages of a flooded town in eastern Taiwan flooded by the effects of Typhoon Ragasa earlier this week. Meanwhile, the local health center is working to resume community services as soon as possible.

Trucks carrying machinery for cleanup operations bring traffic to a halt on the last road connecting this part of Hualien County with the outside world after a burst dam brought flooding downstream and destroyed what used to be the main route for traffic.

Sitting on the remaining County road 193 is the Indigenous village of Atomo, which is also flooded with mud.

While almost every vehicle coming in and out of the flooded town of Guangfu pass by the village every day, residents here feel neglected.

The entire traffic volume of Provincial Highway 9  

has transferred to County Road 193.  

Everyone driving through passes by us.

Some people seem to not know about the damage here.  

We have been forgotten.

Each day since this week’s disaster, volunteers from different cities and counties have arrived at Guangfu station to help with the cleanup. But most of them have concentrated on the busiest area near the train station.

Some volunteers noticed the imbalance and have come to Atomo to help.

There is a manpower surplus in Guangfu town center  

so we thought we’d go where help is more needed.

This area actually needs more support.  

Seeing the situation here was truly shocking.

Just under a kilometer away from the burst riverbank, the local health center is also flooded. Staff members hurry to clear out space to treat injuries and potential health issues brought about by the piled-up waste and dirty mud.

Right now, we have almost zero medical capacity.  

The health and safety of local residents  

are not secure.  

If this place doesn’t reopen  

we won’t be able to operate.

Officials in Guangfu are constantly updating the numbers of casualties and missing persons. As of Saturday afternoon, 16 people are confirmed to have died, six remain missing, and 82 have needed treatment for injuries.

There is also still about 7 million tons of water stored in the dam, and there IS a high chance of it collapsing.

In the meantime, water from the lake keeps cascading into the river and the town, making rescue work more difficult.

As locals and helpers join in the effort to clear out obstacles and waste, they hope any future flooding will bring much less damage.

Alex Chen and Irene Lin for TaiwanPlus.