Taitung Communities Struggle To Recover From Typhoon Krathon

Rural Taitung county faces painful reconstruction a week after Typhoon Krathon slammed the area with heavy rain and landslides.

Transcript

00:00For Ms. Hong, Typhoon Kraton is a nightmare that won't end.

00:04The storm dumped 200 centimetres of rain on this rural part of the southeast last week,

00:08burying the fields and orchards.

00:10On her ruined farm, the amount of clean-up work alone has left her exhausted.

00:14We only have the chest area now, nothing else.

00:17We have to clean up everything ourselves.

00:20And agricultural losses are just one part of the disaster the area's been through.

00:25Raging floodwaters burst embankments and swept whole bridges away.

00:29With so much infrastructure lost, rebuilding the lives of local farmers and others will

00:33take a painfully long time.

00:39And it will take a lot of money.

00:41Just repairing embankments could take close to 16 million US dollars.

00:45And that's money local people say they just don't have.

00:48We have to ask the government and the government to help us.

00:53If they don't help us, we won't be able to pay our bills.

00:56On Friday, officials inspected damage and pledged help.

01:00In addition to the flood damage caused by the Typhoon Kraton,

01:05the Rural Water Protection Agency is already working on a plan

01:09to re-manage the entire water-suffering area.

01:15And a lawmaker representing the area is even talking about using military muscle to help rebuild.

01:27Local people feel that whatever help comes, needs to come quickly.

01:31As much of Taiwan moves on from last week's storm,

01:34in this part of the country, the disaster is far from over.

01:38Andy Hsu and John Van Schriest for Taiwan Plus.