WEATHER
Typhoon Fitow to bring rain
Tropical Storm Fitow has been upgraded to a typhoon and is expected to bring heavy rain to northern and northeastern Taiwan over the weekend, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. As of 2am yesterday, Typhoon Fitow was centered about 940km east of Taiwan’s southernmost tip of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), moving in a north-northwesterly direction at a speed of 12km per hour. The storm is packing maximum sustained winds of 119 kph, with gusts of 155kph, and is expected to strengthen, the bureau said. Fitow’s current projection suggests that it is not likely to make a landfall on Taiwan, but its outer rim, combined with seasonal winds from the northeast, could bring heavy rain over the weekend, forecasters said. On its current path, the typhoon is expected to pass closest to Taiwan tomorrow, according to the bureau’s latest bulletin.
FISHING
Chinese vessel seized
Kinmen Coastal Patrol Corps officers seized a Chinese fishing vessel during an overnight sweep of vessels encroaching into Kinmen’s maritime territory on Thursday to fish, a spokesman for the corps said yesterday. The Chinese fishing boat, the Min Long Yu No. 61154, from Fujian Province, was caught in waters close to islets that are part of Kinmen, the corps said. The vessel was towed to Kinmen’s Liaoluo Harbor earlier in the day, where its 10 crewmen were to face an investigation into their activities, it added.
The vessel was one of more than 50 Chinese fishing boats that sneaked into Kinmen waters late on Thursday, using the cover of night, wind and high seas, according to the Kinmen Coastal Patrol. Since August, when China’s seasonal fishing ban along its coasts was lifted, Chinese fishing boats have frequently been discovered entering Taiwan-controlled waters to fish, the corps said.
SOCIETY
Job quitter lands offer in US
A University of Missouri graduate who used a dance video to quit her job with Taiwanese company Next Media Animation has gotten an offer to work on the Web site of a daytime talk show. Marina Shifrin of Chicago became an Internet sensation after her choreographed performance to Kanye West’s Gone was posted on YouTube. She was a guest on Thursday on Queen Latifah’s talk show on the Fox Network. The host asked Shifrin if she wanted to work as a digital content producer on Latifah’s Web site. At first Shifrin thought Latifah was joking, but the host insisted she was serious. Latifah said a short interview would happen backstage. The show ended without disclosing whether Shifrin had taken the position.
SPORTS
Sports day under review
The Legislative Yuan has passed the first review of an amendment to the National Sports Act (國民體育法), which designates Sept. 9 as the country’s national sports day, when all public sports facilities will be open to the public free of charge. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Ho Hsin-chun (何欣純), who proposed the amendment, said it is aimed at encouraging the general public to participate in various types of physical activity and exercise, to foster sporting habits among them. Under the proposal, students below senior high school level should exercise for least 150 minutes per week, in addition to their regular physical education class. The proposal, adopted by the Education and Culture Committee, will next go to the floor for approval.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching