6.8 Earthquake Shakes Taiwan

A strong earthquake shook much of Taiwan on Sunday, toppling a three-story building and temporarily trapping four people inside, stranding about 400 tourists on a mountainside, and knocking part of a passenger train off its tracks. One person died, and nine people had minor injuries, Taiwan's Emergency Operations Center said. The magnitude 6.8 quake was the largest among dozens that have rattled the island's southeastern coast since Saturday evening, when a 6.4 quake struck the same area, the AP reports.

Most of the damage appeared to be north of the epicenter, which Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau said was in the town of Chishang at the relatively shallow depth of 4 miles. In nearby Yuli town, a cement factory worker died and the three-story building, which had a 7/11 convenience store on the ground floor and residences above it, collapsed, the island's Central News Agency said. The 70-year-old owner of the building and his wife were rescued first, but it took longer to get to a 39-year-old woman and her 5-year-old daughter. The top two stories of the building were left sprawled across a small street and onto the other side, with electricity wires pulled down by the fallen structure.

More than 7,000 households were reported without power in Yuli, and water pipes were damaged. Police and firefighters rushed to a bridge collapse on a two-lane road in what appeared to be a rural part of the same town where three people and one or more vehicles may have fallen off, according to media reports. Also in Yuli, a landslide trapped nearly 400 tourists on a mountain famous for the orange day lilies that blanket its slopes this time of year, the Central News Agency said. They had no electricity and a weak cellphone signal. Debris from a falling canopy on a platform at Dongli station in Fuli town, which is between Yuli and the epicenter at Chishang, hit a passing train, derailing six cars, the Central News Agency said, citing the railway administration. None of the 20 passengers were injured.

(More Taiwan earthquake stories.)