The Central Weather Bureau (CWB) indicated that Typhoon Lupit has weakened to become a tropical depression (TD), but the southwesterly air current will affect Taiwan until the 8th, bringing potentially heavy rainfall. According to the CWB, the TD will approach Taiwan again during the weekend. WRA Director-General Lai Chien-Hsin has monitored the typhoon's developments closely and convened a video conference at 13:00 this afternoon to instruct various River Management Offices to bolster disaster prevention preparations and check the flood prevention equipment to offer any necessary assistance for the sake of protecting the safety of lives and properties in their respective jurisdictions.
WAR subsidized the Hualien County Government to purchase 1,937 flood barriers last year; after assembly, they can form a 1,600m long flood barrier. The lightweight flood barriers are easy, convenient and quick to install, taking only roughly 1/10 of the time compared to traditional sandbags. The advantages such as compactness and ease of transportation make them the new flood prevention tool. Drills were conducted by Hualien City Office this year, demonstrating good assembly speed and flood prevention performance. The 9th River Management Office conducted an inventory of the number of flood barriers within its jurisdiction along with their storage location and contact window to facilitate the allocation of resources. Since the TD presented a greater threat to the central and south Taiwan region, the 9th River Management Office activated the open contract to dispatch 1,000 flood barriers from its jurisdiction to support the 6th River Management Office. Moreover, 2 large mobile flood control pumps were allocated to the 5th River Management Office to realize the concept of resource sharing and flood prevention collaboration.
The 9th River Management Office Director Hsieh Ming-Chan commented that apart from supporting western Taiwan with flood prevention resources, one must also pay attention to the flood prevention preparedness within the office's jurisdiction. These include checking for ponding or flooding hotspots, preparing flood prevention materials for current construction projects, readying flood control pumps, inspecting ongoing constructions, checking the functioning of hydraulic facilities such as levees, revetments and embankments, as well as notifying open contract contractors to stand-by with their machinery and personnel.
The 9th River Management Office once again reminds the public to clean up the surrounding gutters and balcony drainage. They can also obtain the latest information from the WRA app, disaster prevention information network (http://fhy2.wra.gov.tw) and disaster and drought prevention Facebook fan page. God helps those who help themselves, the more you prepare, the less disaster damage you will suffer.