TAIPEI: Taiwan came to a standstill on Saturday with power knocked out for part of the island as it braced for its first typhoon of the year, reports AFP.

Typhoon Nesat -- which strengthened into a moderate storm Friday -- already brought massive waves of over 15 metres (49.2 feet) to the east coast, where it is due to make landfall Saturday night.

Schools and offices were closed across the island, while most train services are suspended. As many as 35,364 households had electricity outages.

As of 1015 GMT, Nesat was 70 kilometres (43.5 miles) southeast of Yilan on Taiwan's east coast, packing gust of up to 180 kilometres (111.8 miles) an hour.

Taiwan's weather bureau warned of torrential rain in the eastern and southern counties, with the tropical storm expected to dump as much as 900 millimetres (35.4 inches) of water in some areas.