Typhoon Heads for Japan; 58 Dead in Taiwan

Typhoon Xangsane whirled away from Taiwan and closer to southern Japan today, leaving 58 dead and 31 missing in the island’s worst flooding in three decades, officials said.

The death toll from the storm, which had earlier killed 40 people and left 66 others missing in the Philippines, does not include the casualties from a Singapore Airlines flight that crashed while taking off Tuesday amid wind gusts and driving rain at the Taipei airport.

A search continued Thursday for 23 crew members of a Panamanian cargo ship, the Spirit of Manila, that sank off Hualien harbor on the eastern coast as Xangsane hit Taiwan, the government disaster relief center said.

The ship sent a distress signal shortly before it sank early Wednesday. Taiwan’s coast guard managed to find a 26-year-old Indonesian sailor who said the ship broke into three pieces from the force of the wind, the relief center added.

Xangsane--which means “elephant” in Thai--had weakened to a tropical storm with winds less than 74 mph as it passed the East China Sea and moved toward Okinawa, Japan, the Central Weather Bureau said.

Prime Minister Chang Chun-hsiung said Taiwan experienced its worst flooding in 30 years, as Xangsane swept across the northern part of the island. Officials estimated that crop and property damage was about $500 million.

The typhoon deaths included 15 people in the city of Keelung who drowned as they prayed while trapped in the basement of a Buddhist temple. Fourteen people drowned in a home for senior citizens while awaiting rescue, local media reported.

On Thursday, divers and rescue workers were paddling through flood waters and picking up residents stranded near their half-submerged houses and cars.