Singaporeans fleeing earthquake grateful for help from Taiwanese

Engineer and his girlfriend got van ride to Kaohsiung, where they flew home

- Michelle Ng

Sitting ducks trapped in a death box that was what a Singaporean engineer and his girlfriend a thought after evacuating from their building when 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck eastern Taiwan on April 3.

"We had evacuated to an elevated open field where we could see the sea, but our phones were blaring with tsunami warnings. Behind us, there were mountains, which I thought were the only place to run to, but there were landslides," said Mr Max Zhang, 28.

"And the aftershocks kept coming. Mentally, it was bad. I was operating at my highest panic level," he told The Sunday Times over the phone on April 5.

Spooked by the quake, the couple cut short their planned weeklong holiday, which started in Taipei on March 30, and flew back to Singapore on the first flight out on April 4.

What was supposed to be a relaxing holiday with his girlfriend to mark his first-year milestone at his job turned out to be the most terrifying experience of his life, said Mr Zhang.

On April 3 at around 8am, he had just woken up in their Airbnb accommodation in Hualien, the city nearest to the quake's epicentre, when the building started to shake violently.