A fierce fire on a fishing boat in waters off Keelung quickly burned out of control yesterday and forced the evacuation of the vessel’s crew of six who were rescued by a nearby ship and the Coast Guard Administration (CGA).
After being rescued, the owner of the fishing boat, surnamed Yen (嚴), accused the CGA of being slow to react to the blaze, saying that the fire had already been burning for an hour before the agency’s’ fire-fighting craft arrived.
However, CGA officials dismissed the allegation there had been a delay in its emergency response.
The CGA said that it received a call reporting a fire offshore at 9:59am, and immediately prepared CGA’s No. 10050 patrol boat, which left the port at 10:18am, and arrived at the burning vessel at 10:30am.
The Li Fa No 368 trawler had departed Keelung’s Badouzi Fishing Harbor (八斗子漁港) at 9am, aiming to fish in waters off Keelung Islet (基隆嶼).
Just before 10am, a fire broke out in the boat’s engine room, and it quickly turned into a major blaze and consumed most of the vessel.
“The blaze enveloped the engine room fast. We tried to put it out with fire extinguishers, but it was no use, the fire was too fierce. Myself and rest of the crew gathered at the bow of the boat, because the rest of the vessel was on fire,” captain Hung Chin-te (洪錦德) said.
He said it was lucky for them that there were other vessels nearby, and recreational fishing boat Jie An No 2 picked up all six crewmembers, and returned them to Badouzi Fishing Harbor.
Hung added that as Li Fa No 368 had just begun its day, it contained a full tank of 12,000 liters of fuel, and thus the flames quickly burned out of control.
The CGA said that its No. 10050 patrol boat fought the blaze with water and also doused it with fire-retardant froth sprays, but failed to stop most of the vessel from being destroyed.
China appears to have built mockups of a port in northeastern Taiwan and a military vessel docked there, with the aim of using them as targets to test its ballistic missiles, a retired naval officer said yesterday. Lu Li-shih (呂禮詩), a former lieutenant commander in Taiwan’s navy, wrote on Facebook that satellite images appeared to show simulated targets in a desert in China’s Xinjiang region that resemble the Suao naval base in Yilan County and a Kidd-class destroyer that usually docks there. Lu said he compared the mockup port to US naval bases in Yokosuka and Sasebo, Japan, and in Subic Bay
Police are investigating the death of a Formosan black bear discovered on Tuesday buried near an industrial road in Nantou County, with initial evidence indicating that it was shot accidentally by a hunter. The bear had been caught in wildlife traps at least five times before, three times since 2020. Codenamed No. 711, the bear received extensive media coverage last year after it was discovered trapped twice in less than two months in the Taichung mountains. After its most recent ensnarement last month, the bear was released in the Dandashan (丹大山) area in Nantou County’s Sinyi Township (信義). However, officials became concerned after the
DETERRENCE: US National Security Council Indo-Pacific Coordinator Kurt Campbell said cross-strait affairs are on the agenda at the US-ASEAN Special Leaders’ Summit The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday thanked the Czech Senate for passing a resolution supporting Taiwan’s inclusion in the WHO and other international organizations for the second consecutive year. The resolution was passed on Wednesday with 51 votes in favor, one opposed and 11 abstentions. In addition to the WHO, it also called for Taiwan’s participation in the “meetings, mechanisms and activities” of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the International Civil Aviation Organization and Interpol. In its opening, the resolution states that the Czech Republic “considers Taiwan as one of its key partners in the Indo-Pacific region,” while noting its
The majority of parents surveyed in northern Taiwan favor the suspension of all on-site classes at schools from the junior-high level and below amid a surge in domestic COVID-19 infections, parent groups said yesterday. About 84.4 percent of respondents in a survey of 2,912 parents in northern Taiwan, where the outbreak is the most serious, said they supported suspending classes, the Action Alliance on Basic Education, the Taiwan Parents Protect Women and Children Association, and the Taiwan Love Children Association said. The groups distributed questionnaires to parents in New Taipei City, Taipei, Keelung, Taoyuan and Hsinchu city and county from Saturday morning