Hong Kong cut off from USA and Europe

On Boxing Day (Dec 26) Taiwan was hit with a major earthquake (about 7.0 Richter) but fortunately minimal loss of life. This quake severed major undersea cables and the Internet (apart from Google's home page and, after a day, usenet) was inaccessible.

I don't understand how an earthquake can damage an undersea cable unless it loosed BentoWan, Thing from the Sea What Eats Cables, but there it is.