Slice of Life
From the South China Morning Post this week in: 1983
Typhoon Ellen struck Hongkong and Macau this week leaving a trail of devastation. Hurricane-force winds raged through Hongkong in the early hours of September 9 as Ellen came within 35 miles and crossed the South China coast. At 3.15am, Ellen was centred about 35 miles south-southwest of Hongkong. Winds of more than 120 knots forced the Royal Observatory to hoist the No10 hurricane signal at 2am, the first time since Typhoon Hope in 1979. Macau was even closer to the centre of the storm, but the No9 signal was not hoisted until 1am.
Confusion reigned as thousands of Hongkongers jostled each other in the race to get home after the No8 signal was raised at 4.45pm. Schools were closed and people rushed to the shops to stock up on food. Flights were cancelled and ferries servicing Victoria Harbour and Macau were halted. Three ships ran aground around Hongkong.
The next day, Governor Sir Edward Youde paid tribute to a fireman who died rescuing a 75-year-old woman after a mudslip wrecked her hut. A second mudslip swept senior station officer Chiu Shing-chow, 33, out to sea near Mount Davis village.
Discovery Bay may have seemed more like disaster bay, with a power blackout that lasted about 19 hours from the night Ellen struck. And some residents had no tap water because, without electricity to drive the pumps, water in roof tanks ran out. And residents learned that it would be a week before any repair work would start on their damaged homes. The typhoon shattered windows, ripped aluminium window frames off their hinges and sucked out air conditioners.
The Zoological and Botanical Gardens would take years to recover after almost three-quarters of its plant life had been uprooted along with century-old trees, while the gardens were covered with debris.
Although two caged birds were gone, two Brazilian monkeys of the marmoset family were born on the night the typhoon hit. A green magpie escaped and a New Guinea Desmarest fig parrot died after being blown into the side of its cage.
Reports indicate that 1,500 hectares of crops and half of the territory's vegetables were damaged. About 100,000 chickens and 2,300 pigs drowned in the flooding.
Three days after Ellen struck, the 375 victims whose huts at Mount Davis were destroyed by a mudslip demanded resettlement in urban areas and refused to leave their temporary shelter in Kennedy Town government secondary school.
On September 13, 10 of the 26 ocean-going ships that ran aground had been refloated, and the list of damaged pleasure craft and fishing boats reached hundreds. At least 25 fishing boats were damaged.
The wreckage of the Hong Kong-based Osprey was found 12 miles east-southeast of Hongkong. The 45-year-old vessel had snapped in half and sank at 6am on Friday morning. It was anchored off Repulse Bay when Ellen struck. Only one survivor, Japanese crewman Mr H. Orula, of eight crew members was found. He was plucked from the sea about 70 miles southwest of Hongkong. Mr Orula said he and three others - a Norwegian woman, an Australian and American skipper Bo Gary - had gone overboard in lifebelts. But after they had an argument on which way they should head to safety, Mr Orula swam off by himself. The others are still missing.
The Osprey, worth US$77,000, was restored by a Japanese consortium and used for pleasure charters around Hongkong. It was a steel-hulled ship built as a three-masted topsail schooner.
By the end of the week, the extent of the economic damage became clear, with the total loss to crops and livestock at HK$50 million.
The only good news from the typhoon was that the High Island Reservoir, Hongkong's biggest, was full for the first time since its completion in 1978. Eleven of the 17 other reservoirs were also full.
In the final toll, 22 were dead or missing, 333 injured, 1,600 people were made homeless, 44 ocean- going vessels were in serious difficulties and 80,000 households suffered power failure.
