Relief effort continues as typhoon toll hits 70

MILITARY helicopters ferried stricken villagers to safety yesterday from remote Taiwanese communities hit by Typhoon Morakot that left at least 70 dead, but hundreds more were still feared trapped by a torrent of mud and rock that buried their homes.

Choppers hovered over affected villages looking for signs of life. While rains were still falling, floodwaters receded yesterday, and many of the aircraft were landing to send out squads of soldiers to look for survivors, photos released by the military showed.

One helicopter crashed into a mountain as it flew on a mission to rescue villagers from the island’s heavily wooded south, which was worst hit by the storm. Disaster official Chen Chung-hsien said it was unclear if the two pilots and one technician had survived the crash.