Rescuers Scour Buildings After Taiwan Quake

Rescue workers scrambled to search for survivors in buildings left tilting precariously on their foundations in the Taiwanese city of Hualien on Wednesday, after an overnight earthquake killed seven and injured more than 250.

Authorities said they could not verify how many residents were still missing after the 6.4-magnitude quake which hit the popular tourist city late on Tuesday.

Rescue efforts were focused on the Yun Tsui residential building, which also housed a restaurant, shops and a hostel. The quake left the 12-storey building leaning to one side, its lower floors pancaked.

The national fire agency said 143 residents from the building remained unaccounted for but it was not immediately clear whether those missing were trapped inside the building or not.

One local who lives nearby recounted how he watched the tower block partially collapse.

"I saw the first floor sink into the ground. Then it sunk and tilted further and the fourth floor became the first floor," said Lu Chih-son, 35, who saw 20 people rescued from the building.

"My family were unhurt, but a neighbour was injured in their head and is bleeding. We dare not go back home now. There are many aftershocks and we are worried the house is damaged," he said.

Chen Chih-wei, 80, said he was sleeping in his apartment on the top floor of the building when the quake struck.

"My bed turned completely vertical, I was sleeping and suddenly I was standing," he said.

He said he managed to crawl his way to a balcony to wait for rescue, adding that the quake was the strongest he had felt in more than five decades of living in Hualien.

President Tsai Ing-wen visited the site Wednesday morning, where officials were going room by room looking for anyone trapped inside.

"Now is the prime time for our rescue efforts, our first priority is to save people," she said in a Facebook post. (AFP)