The only Taiwanese passenger aboard the Turkish Airlines airplane that crashed in Amsterdam on Wednesday said yesterday that he feels very lucky to be alive.
Chen Shi-yin (陳詩尹), an engineer at a high-tech company in Hsinchu County, arrived at the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport yesterday aboard a China Airlines flight, with a scraped forehead, his passport and a plastic bag. His luggage had been aboard the downed plane.
Recalling his narrow escape from death, Chen told reporters that when the crash occurred, his first thought was “So this is what a plane crash is.”
PHOTO: CHU PEI-HSIUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
The Boeing 737-800 airplane, with 135 people on board, crashed while trying to land at Schiphol Airport, killing nine people and injuring 84 others.
Chen said his job required him to travel frequently.
He was heading home from a job in Turkey and took the Turkish Airlines plane to Holland to connect with a flight to Taipei.
Chen said the flight became rough several seconds before the crash. The plane suddenly dropped for one or two seconds and he sensed the captain was trying to pull it up.
“I feel very lucky,” Chen said.
“Because I was the only Oriental on the plane, I got all the attention of the Chinese [language] media after being sent to a nearby hospital,” he said.
Asked whether he was worried about flying again, Chen said he would feel safer taking a Taiwanese airline. The first thing he wants to do after returning to Taiwan was to go home to his wife and five-year-old child, Chen said.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is pushing for residents of Kinmen and Lienchiang counties to acquire Chinese ID cards in a bid to “blur national identities,” a source said. The efforts are part of China’s promotion of a “Kinmen-Xiamen twin-city living sphere, including a cross-strait integration pilot zone in China’s Fujian Province,” the source said. “The CCP is already treating residents of these outlying islands as Chinese citizens. It has also intensified its ‘united front’ efforts and infiltration of those islands,” the source said. “There is increasing evidence of espionage in Kinmen, particularly of Taiwanese military personnel being recruited by the
ENTERTAINERS IN CHINA: Taiwanese generally back the government being firm on infiltration and ‘united front’ work,’ the Asia-Pacific Elite Interchange Association said Most people support the government probing Taiwanese entertainers for allegedly “amplifying” the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda, a survey conducted by the Asia-Pacific Elite Interchange Association showed on Friday. Public support stood at 56.4 percent for action by the Mainland Affairs Council and the Ministry of Culture to enhance scrutiny on Taiwanese performers and artists who have developed careers in China while allegedly adhering to the narrative of Beijing’s propaganda that denigrates or harms Taiwanese sovereignty, the poll showed. Thirty-three percent did not support the action, it showed. The poll showed that 51.5 percent of respondents supported the government’s investigation into Taiwanese who have
South Korean K-pop girl group Blackpink are to make Kaohsiung the first stop on their Asia tour when they perform at Kaohsiung National Stadium on Oct. 18 and 19, the event organizer said yesterday. The upcoming performances will also make Blackpink the first girl group ever to perform twice at the stadium. It will be the group’s third visit to Taiwan to stage a concert. The last time Blackpink held a concert in the city was in March 2023. Their first concert in Taiwan was on March 3, 2019, at NTSU Arena (Linkou Arena). The group’s 2022-2023 “Born Pink” tour set a
A Philippine official has denied allegations of mistreatment of crew members during Philippine authorities’ boarding of a Taiwanese fishing vessel on Monday. Philippine Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) spokesman Nazario Briguera on Friday said that BFAR law enforcement officers “observed the proper boarding protocols” when they boarded the Taiwanese vessel Sheng Yu Feng (昇漁豐號) and towed it to Basco Port in the Philippines. Briguera’s comments came a day after the Taiwanese captain of the Sheng Yu Feng, Chen Tsung-tun (陳宗頓), held a news conference in Pingtung County and accused the Philippine authorities of mistreatment during the boarding of
RSS