DEFENCE
New rocket system unveiled
Taiwan’s army said yesterday it has taken delivery of a new multiple launch rocket system (MLRS) developed and produced by the country’s military technology research unit. The weapons are to be used to improve surface to surface combat ability, the army said. The system, labeled the Thunderbolt-2000, was developed by the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology for the Ministry of National Defense to replace the aging Kung Feng VI rocket system that has been in service for three decades, the army said. The MLRS units, operating under the direction of the army’s 21st Artillery Command, is to begin training once the new system has been installed, the army said. The Thunderbolt-2000 is a high-mobility system that comprises a launcher that can be loaded with 12 MK45 rockets, 27 MK30s or 60 MK15s. The launcher is mounted on a stretched truck chassis and has a firing range of between seven and 45km, according to military data.
SPORT
Lin shows debut of TV advert
Playing basketball is much easier than shooting commercials, NBA star Jeremy Lin (林書豪) said yesterday, following the debut of his first TV commercial at a sponsor’s event in Taipei. Lin, the first American-born NBA player of Taiwanese descent, is currently in Taiwan on a nine-day visit, during which he hosted a four-day summer basketball camp. “It’s much easier to shoot a 3-pointer,” the 24-year-old point guard said, adding that he was really not that good at acting and that he “had to do everything 50 times.” During the 30-second ad, Lin said in both English and Chinese: “I’m not here to live up to anyone else’s expectations; I’m here to live up to mine. I’m Jeremy Lin. The one that I want to surmount is myself.” Lin is scheduled to attend an evangelical gathering hosted by a local television station today before departing for the US tomorrow. Lin, whose meteoric rise early this year with the New York Knicks attracted widespread attention. He signed a three-year, US$25.1 million contract with the Houston Rockets in July after the Knicks failed to match the offer.
TECHNOLOGY
Web usage rate at new high
Internet usage rates in Taiwan reached their highest levels last year with 72 percent of the total population and 82.5 percent of households accessing the Web, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. Last year, more than 14.78 million people aged over 12 were Internet users, representing an increase of 320,000 people from 2010, according to a survey conducted by the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission. Mobile Internet usage rates leapt from 53 percent in 2010 to 70.4 percent last year as a result of the growing prevalence of smartphones and tablet PCs, the survey showed. Taipei topped the list of the surveyed cities and counties registering an Internet usage rate of 80.1 percent, followed by Hsinchu City with 78 percent. Chiayi and Yunlin counties had the lowest rates of around 60 percent last year.
TRANSPORT
HSR begins photo contest
Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp said it is holding a photo contest to encourage passengers to share touching moments from their journeys. People can snap a photo of anything that touches them while they are using the transport service and upload it to the contest website [http://thsrc-shooting.online-event.com.tw] until Sept. 30, the company said.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,