October 8:
That was some hurricane.
Next time a typhoon directly hits Taipei and the Jingmei River is raging like that again, I'm gonna make sure my affairs are all in order and hurl myself into the river! That looked like it would be fun, at least for however long I could survive. The lure to jump in the river was strangely strong. I had to settle for chucking bamboo branches into the raging flow, watching them immediately disappear.
I guess it would be wishful thinking to make it all the way out to the dire Taiwan Straits. White belly up in the sun. Still diving for the big one.
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| SATURDAY, OCTOBER 6, 1:13 p.m. - Full but relatively calm Jingmei River, left bank under the Roosevelt Rd. bridge. |
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| 1:13-1:14 p.m. - looking left (downstream) and right (upstream) and now I can cross. |
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| 2:09-2:10 p.m. - Jingmei market area. Closed due to typhoon. |
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| 2:10 p.m. - I was going to pass on including this as superfluous, but decided I quite like it. |
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| 2:21 p.m. - Back under the Roosevelt Bridge, right bank. Water level reaching the bike path. Photo dead center looks like water being pumped to avoid flooding. Remember this, comparison shot below. |
Aftermath:
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| SUNDAY, OCTOBER 7, 12:12 p.m. - Rode my clunker bike upstream to look at the typhoon's handiwork. |
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| 11:53 a.m. |
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| 12:13 p.m. |
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| 12:22-12:23 p.m. |
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| 12:27-12:34 p.m. - Nat'l Chengchi University area across the river. |
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| 12:37-12:41 p.m. |
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| 1:37 p.m. - Back under the Roosevelt Rd. bridge, Jingmei River back where it belongs. The water obviously rose higher than the previous pic. |
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| 1:45-1:46 p.m. - Heading downstream. Tree covered in river detritus. Watermarks showing how high the river rose. The height of the mark on the lead column mark suggests the force of the water hitting it. |
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| 1:58 p.m. - Plant detritus indicating the river rose as high as the baskets. I'm surprised they didn't get carried away or bent out of shape, but the width of the river here probably meant the flow wasn't as strong. This is the Xindian River, into which the narrower Jingmei drains. |
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| 2:06 p.m. - I saw this float by under the Jingmei bridge the previous night! I went out at night, too, when conditions weren't harrowing, and while crossing the bridge I saw this couch floating under and that's what prompted the thought of flinging myself into the river and try riding it out to the Taiwan Straits. I don't know where it got picked up by the river, but this is more than a kilometer downstream from where I saw it; deposited here ostensibly because of the decreased strength of the river flow. I wonder how much further downstream my body would've made it. What am I talking about? I would've survived and swum to safety and climbed out totally dry. |
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| 2:15 p.m. - By the Gongguan riverside access point. |
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| MONDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2:31 p.m. - Back to classes, navigating the mud-covered bikeway. |
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| OCTOBER 10, 12:55-12:57 p.m. |
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| 1:01 p.m. - Trees that didn't fare so well. |
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| 1:03 p.m. - Plant detritus again indicating the height the water reached. |
