Traffic flowed relatively smoothly on and freeways nationwide yesterday, on the final day of the Lunar New Year holiday, the National Freeway Bureau reported.
To ease traffic on the final day of the holiday, the bureau closed toll booths from midnight to 7am yesterday.
Bureau statistics showed that about 440,000 vehicles took to the freeways between midnight and 7am, while about 810,000 drove on freeways before noon, 160,000 less than the same period on Sunday.
It appeared that most people traveled on the roads before yesterday. As a result, there was little heavy highway congestion on the last day of the holiday, the bureau said.
According to the bureau, the average travel time on Freeway No. 1 from Greater Kaohsiung to Taipei yesterday was approximately five hours, almost the same amount of time as on a non-holiday.
Traffic appeared to be a bit more congested on Freeway No. 1 on northbound sections between Greater Taichung and the Taya Interchange in the morning, the bureau said.
In the afternoon, there was heavy traffic on northbound sections of the freeway between the Changhua and Puyan interchanges.
Freeway No. 5, connecting Taipei and Yilan County, was also highly congested yesterday, the bureau said.
In related news, a Uni Airways (立榮航空) flight from Greater Kaohsiung to Kinmen made an unscheduled landing in Penghu at 9:10am yesterday after a warning light for an engine went off during the flight. There were no injuries to the 39 passengers on board.
The airline dispatched another plane to take the passengers back to Kinmen at 10:30am.
Uni Airways said it was still investigating the incident.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique