Seventy percent of the fire suits worn by Taipei firefighters are “expired” and potentially worn out, putting their lives at risk, city councilors said yesterday.
Taipei City councilors Wang Wei-chung (王威中) and Kao Chia-yu (高嘉瑜) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said that an inventory list provided by the Taipei Fire Department showed only 349 suits for the department’s 1,243 firefighters. While the department claimed that any additional suits had been “scrapped,” interviews with firefighters revealed that close to 1,000 expired suits with more than three years of usage continued to be worn by city firefighters, the councilors said.
National Association for Firefighters’ Rights secretary-general Cheng Ya-ling (鄭雅菱) said the continued use of older suits was worrisome because there was no system in place for testing suit safety, with firefighters instead required to report any problems themselves.
She said that important problems — such as the suits’ fabric becoming brittle — could not be reliably tested by firefighters themselves without specialized instruments.
In addition, firefighters often feel embarrassed to ask for a replacement suit if damage is not obvious, although even a small puncture greatly reduces suit safety, she said.
“Most firefighters’ suits and hats have never been inspected,” she said “They have no way of being certain that this equipment can protect them, with ‘testing’ only occurring during real emergencies.”
However, even if firefighters discover a problem, the department’s lack of backup suits and equipment means that they must wait up to eight months before receiving a new suit, she said.
The Taipei Fire Department’s disaster rescue division director Wang Cheng-hsiung (王證雄) said that the department had provided an “erroneous” inventory list due to a “misunderstanding.”
While the Executive Yuan has set a three-year standard for the replacement of fire suits, because the suits are permanently flameproof, the department has chosen to use many suits for more than three years due to budget constraints, he said, adding that new suits cost NT$23,000 each.
He said that half of the department’s suits received a manual safety check every year during their biannual washing, adding that the check only encompassed deformities visible to the naked eye, with no way of determining whether the suits’ material had become brittle.
He added the department had already decided to begin replacing the suits every three years to improve safety and to provide all firefighters with their own backup suit, beginning with a budget request for 400 new suits this year.
POLAM KOPITIAM CASE: Of the two people still in hospital, one has undergone a liver transplant and is improving, while the other is being evaluated for a liver transplant A fourth person has died from bongkrek acid poisoning linked to the Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said yesterday, as two other people remain seriously ill in hospital. The first death was reported on March 24. The man had been 39 years old and had eaten at the restaurant on March 22. As more cases of suspected food poisoning involving people who had eaten at the restaurant were reported by hospitals on March 26, the ministry and the Taipei Department of Health launched an investigation. The Food and
The long-awaited Taichung aquarium is expected to open next year after more than a decade of development. The building in Cingshui District (清水) is to feature a large ocean aquarium on the first floor, coral display area on the second floor, a jellyfish tank and Dajia River (大甲溪) basin display on the third, a river estuary display and restaurant on the fourth, and a cafe and garden on the fifth. As it is near Wuci Fishing Port (梧棲漁港), many are expecting the opening of the aquarium to bring more tourism to the harbor. Speaking at the city council on Monday, Taichung City Councilor
A fourth person has died in a food poisoning outbreak linked to the Xinyi (信義) branch of Malaysian restaurant chain Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in Taipei, Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝) said on Monday. It was the second fatality in three days, after another was announced on Saturday. The 40-year-old woman experienced multiple organ failure in the early hours on Monday, and the family decided not to undergo emergency resuscitation, Wang said. She initially showed signs of improvement after seeking medical treatment for nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, but her condition worsened due to an infection, he said. Two others who
Taiwanese should be mindful when visiting China, as Beijing in July is likely to tighten the implementation of policies on national security following the introduction of two regulations, a researcher said on Saturday. China on Friday unveiled the regulations governing the law enforcement and judicial activities of national security agencies. They would help crack down on “illegal” and “criminal” activities that Beijing considers to be endangering national security, according to reports by China’s state media. The definition of what constitutes a national security threat in China is vague, Taiwan Thinktank researcher Wu Se-chih (吳瑟致) said. The two procedural regulations are to provide Chinese