Taiwan Mops Up After Typhoon

(AP) TAIPEI, Taiwan - Soldiers and Buddhist volunteers helped Taiwanese villagers clean up their homes Tuesday after a powerful typhoon churned through, killing at least two people and leaving a trail of flooded buildings, damaged orchards and caved-in roads.

Typhoon Fung Wong hit Taiwan just before dawn Monday, packing winds of 105 miles (167 kilometers) per hour. It left the island, heading for the Chinese mainland, about nine hours later.

In the neighboring Philippines, at least four people were killed and five were missing, including a 3-year-old girl and her mother, after Fung Wong skirted past the northern provinces on its way to Taiwan, officials said Tuesday. About 10,000 Filipinos were affected by the typhoon.

In Taiwan, soldiers used shovels to remove ankle-deep mud from homes in villages in eastern Hualien county, where the typhoon made landfall.

In a briefing to President Ma Ying-jeou, Hualien County Chief Hsieh Shen-shan said agricultural damage to the county amounted to more than 160 million New Taiwan dollars ($5.3 million).

Elsewhere in the county, he said, workers were repairing caved-in mountain roads that had blocked traffic in both directions.

The storm dumped more than 33 inches (82 centimeters) of rain in Hualien, Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau said.

Television stations reported that authorities were closely monitoring several bridges where supports sustained damage from Fung Wong and tropical storm Kalmaegi, which killed 19 people when it struck Taiwan earlier this month.

Typhoons frequently hit Taiwan between July and September, often triggering flash floods and landslides in overly developed mountainous regions.