TSMC's operations around Taiwan back to normal after earthquake

Taipei, Jan. 22 (CNA) Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.'s (TSMC) operations returned to normal around Taiwan Tuesday morning after a strong earthquake hit southern Taiwan just after midnight Monday.

TSMC evacuated its employees and shut down machines in its plants located in the Central Taiwan Science Park and the Southern Taiwan Science Park soon after a magnitude 6.4 earthquake rocked Chiayi County at 12:17 a.m.

According to the chipmaker, the earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a seismic event, measured a 5 in the Southern Taiwan Science Park and a 4 in the Central Taiwan Science Park, enough to cause strong shaking and startle people.

TSMC said it evacuated its employees based on its standard preventive procedures, and their safety was confirmed at around 1 a.m.

The company inspected its facilities around Taiwan for structural damage before restarting operations, and said its water and electricity supplies and industrial security systems in its plants were not affected.

In Tainan, TSMC rolls out chips made using the 3 nanometer process, the most advanced technology TSMC currently has in mass production. It expects to begin commercial production of the more sophisticated 2nm process later this year.

The chipmaker said construction of its new facilities in Taiwan continued Tuesday, unaffected by the earthquake.

Echoing TSMC, the Southern Taiwan Science Park Bureau said workers in plants there are back at work and water and power supplies are normal.

The bureau said no injuries, fires, or chemical leaks were reported in the park after the earthquake.

But some factory and dorm elevators in the science park still needed to be repaired, the bureau said.

Outside the science park, the earthquake and its aftershocks have caused houses and roads to collapse and left 26 injured and 50 people isolated in a village near the location of the earthquake's epicenter.