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Super typhoon kills three, injures hundreds in Taiwan

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AFP Taipei
Super typhoon Dujuan has killed three people and left more than 300 injured in Taiwan, authorities said today after it swept across the island before making landfall in eastern China.

It hit the Chinese coastal city of Putian by Tuesday afternoon, state news agency Xinhua said, but there were no immediate reports of damage.

Many of those injured in Taiwan were hit by flying debris or involved in traffic accidents, the Emergency Operation Centre said, putting the death toll at three and the number of injured at 346.

Severe winds uprooted trees and smashed windows while heavy rains triggered multiple landslides.
 

More than 12,000 people were evacuated and almost 3,000 are in temporary shelters, authorities said.

Over 175,000 homes are still without electricity as the storm left a trail of destruction in the north of the island.

One of the dead was a 54-year-old man swept in the air by winds at a construction site. A 70-year-old man died after a fall and a 41-year-old woman was killed in a car accident.

Taiwan's aboriginal mountain communities are particularly at risk during typhoons, as areas often affected by flooding and mudslides.

Landslides blocked the roads into the hot spring town of Wulai, in mountains just outside the capital Taipei.

It was the latest hit for Wulai which was severely damaged by flooding and landslides in August when Typhoon Soudelor hit, with some residents unable to return home for weeks.

Many shops and hotels were still rebuilding even as the latest typhoon struck.

"The roads are blocked but residents aren't in any immediate danger," a spokesman for New Taipei City fire department told AFP.

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First Published: Sep 29 2015 | 6:02 PM IST

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