2 Dead as Typhoon Nepartak Heads Out to Sea | WeatherBug
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2 Dead as Typhoon Nepartak Heads Out to Sea

August 14, 2017
By Taiwan News
TAIPEI (Taiwan News)  The eye of Typhoon Nepartak headed out into the Taiwan Strait near Tainan around 2:30 pm Friday, the Central Weather Bureau said, warning residents against complacency. The storm, which was downgraded from the status of a super typhoon earlier in the day, made landfall near Taimali in Taitung County at 5:50 am before making its way across Southern Taiwan at a relatively slow pace.
By 2:30 pm, the weather bureau located the center of the typhoon at 20 kilometers north-northwest of Tainan and moving northwest at a speed of 12 kilometers per hour in the general direction of Penghu. Sustained winds of 155 kph with gusts of up to 191 kph were still raging around the storm, the bureau said.

The typhoon left two people dead and more than 70 injured, while more than 200,000 households lost power Winds were so strong they had been able to blow three empty freight train wagons off the rails at Taitung station, reports said. Weather forecasters predicted heavy torrential rain in at least Kaohsiung City and the counties of Taitung, Hualien, Pingtung and Chiayi While the eye of the storm had left the island and was now moving over sea, the impact of the storm would still continue to be felt into Friday night, the bureau said, cautioning the public against underestimating its strength.

The storm had moved on a course that was further to the south than anticipated, leaving the area around the capital Taipei in the far north relatively unscathed. By noon Friday, there were gusts of wind but otherwise little evidence of a typhoon.

The day had been declared a holiday for all offices and schools all over Taiwan's main island, and many department stores and shopping malls remained closed at least until the afternoon.