Two Quakes Rattle Taiwan, Undersea Cable Damaged
Date: 10-Sep-07
Country: CHINA
Last December, a series of earthquakes off Taiwan damaged
eight undersea cables, knocking millions of Internet users
offline and disrupting banking services from Seoul to Sydney.
The US Geological Survey measured the magnitude of the
first quake at 6.5 at 01:51 a.m. local time (1551 GMT).
Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau said the second tremor followed
four minutes later with a magnitude of 5.7.
The Central Weather Bureau said the epicentre of the first
quake was 76 km (47 miles) southeast of the island and 27 km
deep, and the second one about 10 km farther away. It measured
the first quake at magnitude 6.6 and the second at 5.7.
Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan's top telecommunications carrier,
said an undersea cable to Japan was damaged and was under
repair.
"All communications are more or less back to normal," a
Chunghwa spokeswoman said.
Taiwan's disaster centre said they had no reports of
casualties.
Earthquakes are common in Taiwan but do not often cause
serious damage. The worst in recent years was in 1999, when at
least 2,000 people died in a quake measuring 7.6 in central
Taiwan.
