TOKYO: Typhoon Dolphin lashed Japan’s southern Okinawa prefecture on Saturday (Aug 8), injuring five people and cutting power to 14,000 buildings, while China shut ports and halted ferries ahead of the storm’s expected arrival on its east coast.
Five elderly people, three of whom fell due to strong winds, suffered non-life-threatening injuries in Okinawa while another person was injured in Kagoshima prefecture, authorities said.
Nearly 39,000 buildings were without power in Kagoshima while just over 12,000 were affected in Okinawa. Domestic airlines, ANA and Japan Airlines, cancelled flights to and from Okinawa.
The storm was about 160km northwest of Kume Island in Okinawa as of 3am GMT (11am, Singapore time), moving northwest at 15kmh, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.
The typhoon had maximum sustained winds of 162kmh with gusts reaching 216kmh.
Okinawa and Amami island in Kagoshima prefecture are the main areas expected to be affected in Japan.
In China, where the typhoon is expected to make landfall between late Sunday and early Monday, authorities have designated Dolphin as an orange-category typhoon – the second-highest level.
Worried about the risk of flooding and landslides, authorities also raised the emergency response level for Dolphin by one notch to level III, the second-lowest level.
The typhoon is most likely to make landfall between Zhoushan city in Zhejiang province and Fuding city in Fujian province and is expected to bring winds of 38 to 45 metres per second near its centre, according to China’s National Meteorological Center.
PORTS AND AIRPORTS HALT OPERATIONS
Rain and strong winds are expected to affect eastern China through Aug 12, including parts of Shanghai and neighbouring provinces. Some areas of eastern Zhejiang could receive more than 600mm of rain, according to forecasters.
Zhejiang raised its coastal typhoon alert to its highest level, halted port operations and suspended 162 passenger ferry routes.
Ningbo Lishe International Airport in Zhejiang said it will halt operations from 11.30pm on Saturday and suspend all flights on Sunday. Shanghai’s Yangshan port had been cleared of vessels by late Friday, while some rail services in the Yangtze River Delta will be suspended from Sunday.
In Taiwan, 78 international flights were cancelled because of the typhoon, the government said. Heavy rain was expected in northern parts of the island over the weekend, though authorities had not ordered evacuations as of Saturday.
China has ordered that, due to the typhoon, ships passing through the Taiwan Strait must heed its traffic control instructions – measures that Taipei denounced.
China, which views Taiwan as its own territory, also claims the strategic strait. Both Taipei and Washington reject that claim.