Weather, climate & earthquakes

The weather today 32 degrees C

Summing up continued...

Typhoons and climate

I arrived in Taiwan during the typhoon season and was promptly given a taste of one. This one actually turned out to be the worse one of the year where I was living but it was not as bad as I had expected. The rain, although very heavy and prolonged, was no worse than you might get now and again in Europe during a brief heavy downpour. The wind of course made things much more dramatic and combined with flying debris made going anywhere virtually impossible. This meant you could be housebound for a day or two. However I found the heat to be my biggest enemy and from June - October being outside for any length of time was unpleasant. I found myself darting from station to department store to car A/C, trying to avoid the heat like I was avoiding a heavy downpour. Everyone I talked to assured me that it cooled down for several months in winter but this just left me with visions of more of the same after Christmas. As it happened I think I was gravely misled by everyone as from November onwards the temperature dropped to a more comfortable 20-25 degrees and remained more or less in that ball park for the next 6 months. In fact it was glorious for the most part particularly as there was little rain and no typhoons. I expected to be plagued by dreaded mosquitoes too but even they failed to materialize thus making my stay a very pleasant one.

Earthquakes

Early on I experienced the earth quaking while typing one evening on my laptop. More a tremor than a quake and all over before you realized what it was. In fact these tremors are frequent but rarely felt until they reached 5.0 on the Richter scale. During my year long stay I probably felt about 10-15 of these none of which caused me any concern. It was only when a 6.1 quake hit in March that I realized the incredible force that could be unleashed. I was on the 6th floor in my office as the building began to violently shake sending plastic panels flying. I jumped out of my office to see the secretary and we looked at each other in bemused confusion. What to do, I had no idea, would the building collapse? Should I hide under a desk or make a run for it, but by the time these thoughts had crossed my mind it was all over and only the excited chatter of some students remained. The second one a few days ago was a 6.3 which happened while I was in my room also on the 6th floor. This felt even more violent and I dashed out of my room and into corridor ready to descend the stairs, locking myself out in the process by forgetting to take my keys. These quakes are so violent that you sense the buildings would not withstand it for any prolonged period. Thankfully they are usually very short lasting maybe only 15 seconds but there is a sense that you need to escape the building within a minute should it be prolonged. Both these quakes were close by and the second one was even felt in Hong Kong over 700km away apparently. It makes you aware of just how vulnerable we are and that the earth really is a living entity or sleeping giant that we must respect.