Taiwan Braces for Powerful Typhoon Kong-rey

Taiwan shuttered its schools and offices, grounded some flights, closed financial markets, issued land and sea warnings and mobilized the military as it braced for Typhoon Kong-rey to make landfall on Thursday as one of the strongest storms to hit the island in years.

Packing winds of up to 132 m.ph., the approaching storm was forecast to hit as the equivalent of a Category 4 hurricane along Taiwan’s eastern coast on Thursday, according to meteorologists.

“This typhoon is moving fast and will bring strong winds and heavy rain,” Cho Jung-tai, Taiwan’s premier, said on Facebook.

Kong-rey was in the Philippine Sea early on Thursday morning local time after skirting the northern Philippines, which was battered by Tropical Storm Trami last week. The Philippine government said on Wednesday that the two storms combined had killed at least 139 people and left at least 21 others missing.

All of Taiwan was under land and sea warnings early Thursday, according to the Central Weather Administration. Land warnings are issued when a typhoon’s sustained winds of at least 39 miles per hour are predicted to hit within 18 hours, according to the agency. Sea warnings are issued when the typhoon’s radius of sustained winds of at least 34 knots, or 39 m.p.h., are expected to come within 100 kilometers, about 62 miles, of Taiwan’s coast within 24 hours.

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