Three Taiwanese climbers who scaled Mount Everest last week returned home from Bangkok yesterday, with all three ready for their next challenge.
Chiang Hsiu-chen (江秀真) and her fellow mountaineers received a hero’s welcome at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport. Their success made Chiang the first Taiwanese woman to conquer the highest peaks on seven continents. It also marked the first time in 13 years that Taiwanese alpinists made it to the top of the 8,848m Mt Everest, said the Atunas Group, which organized the latest expedition.
Chiang, 39, has scaled the highest mountain in the world from both the north side and the south side of the peak, after completing the assault on Mt Everest’s summit last week from the south side, the more conventional route. She climbed the more treacherous north side 14 years ago.
PHOTO: CHU PEI-HSIUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
MISSION
Chiang, a mountain ranger at Yushan National Park, and the two male climbers — Wu Yu-lung (伍玉龍), a 49-year-old Bunun tribesman who is the leader of a rescue team, and 33-year-old Huang Chih-hao (黃致豪), who is doing postdoctorate research in electronic engineering at Colorado State University — reached the top of Mt Everest at 12:52pm on May 19.
In a brief interview with the Central News Agency at the airport, Chiang said she was looking forward to her next mission — developing a system to teach mountain climbing in Taiwan.
“Teaching and training [people] about mountain climbing is even more challenging than scaling Mt Everest,” she said. “I will try my best in the next 20 years to contribute to mountain-climbing in Taiwan, an island that boasts a number of high peaks.”
Wu said he would work two or three more years to save enough money to challenge the world’s third-highest peak in India.
Huang said his next challenge would be climbing one of the world’s highest mountains without the aid of bottled oxygen and Sherpa guides, and making a documentary about it.
Three batches of banana sauce imported from the Philippines were intercepted at the border after they were found to contain the banned industrial dye Orange G, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said yesterday. From today through Sept. 2 next year, all seasoning sauces from the Philippines are to be subject to the FDA’s strictest border inspection, meaning 100 percent testing for illegal dyes before entry is allowed, it said in a statement. Orange G is an industrial coloring agent that is not permitted for food use in Taiwan or internationally, said Cheng Wei-chih (鄭維智), head of the FDA’s Northern Center for
LOOKING NORTH: The base would enhance the military’s awareness of activities in the Bashi Channel, which China Coast Guard ships have been frequenting, an expert said The Philippine Navy on Thursday last week inaugurated a forward operating base in the country’s northern most province of Batanes, which at 185km from Taiwan would be strategically important in a military conflict in the Taiwan Strait. The Philippine Daily Inquirer quoted Northern Luzon Command Commander Lieutenant General Fernyl Buca as saying that the base in Mahatao would bolster the country’s northern defenses and response capabilities. The base is also a response to the “irregular presence this month of armed” of China Coast Guard vessels frequenting the Bashi Channel in the Luzon Strait just south of Taiwan, the paper reported, citing a
UNDER PRESSURE: The report cited numerous events that have happened this year to show increased coercion from China, such as military drills and legal threats The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) aims to reinforce its “one China” principle and the idea that Taiwan belongs to the People’s Republic of China by hosting celebratory events this year for the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, the “retrocession” of Taiwan and the establishment of the UN, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said in its latest report to the Legislative Yuan. Taking advantage of the significant anniversaries, Chinese officials are attempting to assert China’s sovereignty over Taiwan through interviews with international news media and cross-strait exchange events, the report said. Beijing intends to reinforce its “one China” principle
A total lunar eclipse, an astronomical event often referred to as a “blood moon,” would be visible to sky watchers in Taiwan starting just before midnight on Sunday night, the Taipei Astronomical Museum said. The phenomenon is also called “blood moon” due to the reddish-orange hue it takes on as the Earth passes directly between the sun and the moon, completely blocking direct sunlight from reaching the lunar surface. The only light is refracted by the Earth’s atmosphere, and its red wavelengths are bent toward the moon, illuminating it in a dramatic crimson light. Describing the event as the most important astronomical phenomenon
RSS