Taiwan's weather bureau has urged residents to prepare for
Typhoon Matsa, which it said could hit the island today or
tomorrow, bringing strong winds and heavy rains and triggering
landslides.
Matsa, the name of a fish in Laos, was 560 kilometers
east-southeast of Taiwan's southernmost tip of Oluanpi on Wednesday
morning, the bureau said.
With a radius of 250 kilometers, it was moving northwest at 15
kilometers per hour, it said.
Residents in low-lying areas were urged to guard against floods
while those in mountainous regions were told to watch out for
mudslides.
Matsa is expected to sweep through Fujian
or Zhejiang
after Taiwan, according to forecasters.
In August last year, Typhoon Aere claimed 24 lives when strong
winds and downpours touched off mudslides, burying an entire
village in the mountains of northern Hsinchu County.
(Shenzhen Daily August 4, 2005)