An emergency drill should be held each month from next month to May on the Suhua Highway to ensure a high level of disaster preparedness, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said yesterday during a bus trip on the problematic stretch of road.
As the rainy season approaches, Ma said, information about the drills should also be made available online so the public can become familiar with the highway’s road conditions and be better prepared in the event of a natural disaster.
Upgrading the highway began late last month after 26 people were killed there by landslides during Typhoon Megi in October.
In a briefing to Ma, the head of the Directorate-General of Highways (DGH), Wu Meng-fen (吳盟分), said the DGH would erect another four changeable message signs along the highway by the end of April to provide real-time traffic information.
Wu added that the DGH planned to install 35 additional closed-circuit television cameras and designate 21 emergency shelters to enhance evacuation capability on the highway.
Meanwhile, on the second day of a hiking activity organized by Hualien County Commissioner Fu Kun-chi (傅崑萁) to promote tourism along the highway, Fu joined the briefing and asked the president to help give Hualien more exposure by promoting the county to international media.
Fu also urged the government to keep gravel trucks off the road as the vehicles could damage the highway’s foundations, some sections of which are built on geologically unstable land.
In response, Minister of Transportation and Communications Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國), who was also on the tour along with Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), said his ministry would enhance rail and sea transportation in eastern Taiwan to help transport gravel.
Mao said the measure, expected to take effect on July 1, would reduce the volume of traffic by at least 70 percent on sections of the highway south of Heren (和仁), a major mining area, by 2013.
EXPANSIONIST: China deploys an average of 40 to 50 warships and coast guard vessels daily in the South China Sea, despite pledges not to militarize the region, an official said China is attempting to expand its influence across the First Island Chain and increase pressure on Japan by sending coast guard vessels into waters off of Taiwan under the pretext of maritime negotiations with Japan and the Philippines, a national security official said yesterday. China’s recent actions in the waters east of Taiwan and Japan and the Philippines’ exclusive economic zones (EEZ) are attempts to establish dominance in First Island Chain waters, said the official who declined to be named, adding that this is “expansion disguised as law enforcement.” Framing China’s actions solely as a cross-strait issue is a serious misjudgment that
Through analyzing fossil evidence, a research team at National Taiwan University (NTU) discovered the largest endemic bird to have lived in Taiwan, naming it Pavo miejue, or extinct peafowl (滅絕孔雀). The Mikado pheasant, which is printed on the back of the NT$1,000 bank note, was previously believed to be the biggest endemic bird to Taiwan. The research team’s findings suggest that Pavo miejue lived during the Pleistocene epoch tens of thousands of years ago. It is the first endemic extinct bird species discovered and formally named in Taiwan. The study was coauthored by NTU Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修),
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is to suspend its automated Skytrain service connecting Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 starting on July 1 to facilitate connection works for the upcoming Terminal 3, the airport operator said today. Passengers and staff who need to travel between the two terminals after the suspension can instead use the Taoyuan MRT or the airport's 24-hour shuttle bus service, Taoyuan International Airport Corp said. The Taoyuan MRT Airport Line directly links the two terminals, while the shuttle buses are to operate around the clock, the company added. The Skytrain provides free transportation between the airport’s two terminals for travelers and
Taiwan ranked 42nd in terms of peacefulness among 163 countries, down five places from last year, according to this year’s Global Peace Index. With an overall score of 1.751, Taiwan dropped from 37th last year, the report published by the global Institute for Economics and Peace showed. The overall score measures a country’s level of peacefulness using 23 quantitative and qualitative indicators across three domains — ongoing domestic and international conflict, societal safety and security, and militarization. While Taiwan ranked 42nd worldwide, it was listed in ninth place among the 19 Asian-Pacific countries in the report, after New Zealand, Singapore, Japan, Malaysia,
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