Rescuers continued on Wednesday to search for survivors of a deadly 6.0-magnitude earthquake which struck off the eastern coast of Taiwan, killing at least four people and injuring 225.
The city of Hualian was worst affected by the late Tuesday quake.
A 60-year-old woman was killed when the city’s Marshal Hotel collapsed, trapping at least another two people inside, the Central Emergency Operation Center (CEOC).
A total of 116 people were evacuated from the 11-storey building.
A 66-year-old man was killed elsewhere in the city, CEOC said, while another two people were found dead in a 12-storey residential building that collapsed in the quake.
At least 225 people were injured, state-run Central News Agency reported, and at least 145 people were still missing.
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President Tsai Ing-wen tried to reassure people on Wednesday, saying that rescue teams would work relentlessly to find those trapped by the quake.
In Hualien, almost 500 people were sent to temporary shelters, CEOC said, while 1,800 households were without power and another 40,000 households had no water.
Major roads were disrupted and cars were unable to cross some bridges, CEOC said.
The quake recorded a shallow epicentre, just 18.3 kilometres north of Hualien at a depth of 10 kilometres, Taiwain’s Central Weather Bureau said.
The quake, recorded at 11.50 pm local time Tuesday (1550 GMT), was felt across Taiwan and followed a spate of earthquakes over the past few days, according to the bureau.(dpa/NAN)
