At least 17 people were killed when a decades-old barrier lake burst in Taiwan, government officials said Wednesday, after Super Typhoon Ragasa pounded the island with torrential rain.

The lake in eastern Hualien county -- formed by series of landslides that created a natural dam wall -- burst Tuesday, washing away a bridge and sweeping into a town with a trail of thick sludge and mud.

"It was like a volcano erupting.... the muddy floodwaters came roaring straight into the first floor of my house," Hsu Cheng-hsiung, 55, a neighbourhood leader of Guangfu township, told AFP.

The death toll in Hualien rose to 17 from 14, while the number of missing fell from 152 to 17 as most people have been located, the National Fire Agency said.

"Seventeen people remain missing after the Mataian Creek

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