Hope and Future: Morakot Typhoon Memorial Hall
Opened 2018
Deep in the third basement the museum keeps a quieter, more serious hall. It remembers Typhoon Morakot, which struck southern Taiwan in August two thousand and nine and dropped nearly three metres of rain on the mountains in a few days. Rivers burst, hillsides collapsed, and the village of Xiaolin in the Kaohsiung hills was buried by a landslide with hundreds of its people. The hall opened in twenty eighteen to mark the tenth anniversary, and it combines an immersive theatre, in which projected rain and floodwater surround the audience, with salvaged objects, photographs and the recorded voices of survivors and rescuers.
The display is built as a journey. You begin with the science of typhoons and the geography that makes Taiwan's south so vulnerable, then enter the theatre to experience the storm, then pass through the rescue and the long reconstruction of roads, bridges and communities. Look for the personal objects recovered from the mud, the maps that show how the river changed course, and the section on indigenous villages that were relocated to new land. The tone is careful and respectful, and the final rooms turn to hope, showing how warning systems, engineering and education have improved since.
It may seem an unusual thing for a science museum to hold, but the hall is central to what this museum does: it sits in a city that lived through the disaster and it explains, with evidence, how to prepare for the next one. Give it half an hour and go with children who are old enough for the subject. The theatre runs on a fixed schedule, so check the times at the desk on the way down.
Did You Know? The immersive theatre uses projected water and sound so convincingly that the museum posts a note warning visitors who are sensitive to the effects.
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