Two air force pilots whose AT-3 training aircraft crashed in mountains in central Taiwan last week died from a frontal impact crash at high speed, the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office said on Monday.
The office said a coroner’s report released on Monday afternoon showed that the bodies of 32-year-old Major Wang Ching-chun (王勁鈞) and 23-year-old First Lieutenant Huang Chun-jung (黃俊榮), who were piloting the plane, did not exhibit any toxic or drug reactions during the incident, the report said.
In addition, no carbon particles were found in their trachea, indicating that they died instantly upon impact rather than from smoke inhalation, the report said.
The coroners said the two pilots died immediately from the frontal impact of their aircraft crashing nose-first into a mountain.
The AT-3 took off from an air force base in Kaohsiung at 11:55am on Sept. 22 and lost contact with air traffic controllers 30 minutes later, the air force said.
The plane, which had been in service for about 27 years, disappeared from radar screens in the skies over Nantou County, it said.
Wang was in the front seat of the plane and Huang was in the back during the routine training flight. Both of them were found dead in the cabin on Saturday, the air force said.
Wang, who had clocked 1,489 flight hours, was a flight instructor at Kaohsiung’s Air Force Academy, while Huang had 116 hours of flying experience.
“China is preparing to invade Taiwan,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) said in an exclusive interview with British media channel Sky News for a special report titled, “Is Taiwan ready for a Chinese invasion?” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said today in a statement. The 25-minute-long special report by Helen Ann-Smith released yesterday saw Sky News travel to Penghu, Taoyuan and Taipei to discuss the possibility of a Chinese invasion and how Taiwan is preparing for an attack. The film observed emergency response drills, interviewed baseball fans at the Taipei Dome on their views of US President
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a "tsunami watch" alert after a magnitude 8.7 earthquake struck off the Kamchatka Peninsula in northeastern Russia earlier in the morning. The quake struck off the east coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula at 7:25am (Taiwan time) at a depth of about 19km, the CWA said, citing figures from the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. The CWA's Seismological Center said preliminary assessments indicate that a tsunami could reach Taiwan's coastal areas by 1:18pm today. The CWA urged residents along the coast to stay alert and take necessary precautions as waves as high as 1m could hit the southeastern
ECONOMIC BENEFITS: The imports from Belize would replace those from Honduras, whose shrimp exports have dropped 67 percent since cutting ties in 2023 Maintaining ties with Taiwan has economic benefits, Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials said yesterday, citing the approval of frozen whiteleg shrimp imports from Belize by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as an example. The FDA on Wednesday approved the tariff-free imports from Belize after the whiteleg shrimp passed the Systematic Inspection of Imported Food, which would continue to boost mutual trade, the ministry said. Taiwan’s annual consumption of whiteleg shrimps stands at 30,000 tonnes, far exceeding domestic production, the ministry said. Taiwan used to fill the gap by importing shrimps from Honduras, but purchases slumped after Tegucigalpa severed diplomatic ties with Taiwan
The Executive Yuan yesterday approved a southwestern extension of the Sanying MRT Line from New Taipei to Bade District (八德) in Taoyuan, with a goal of starting construction by late 2026. The 4.03-kilometer extension, featuring three new stations, will run from the current terminus at Yingtao Fude Station (LB12) in New Taipei City to Dannan Station (LB14), where it will connect with Taoyuan’s Green Line, New Taipei City Metro Corp said in a statement. This extension will follow the completion of core Sanying Line, a 14.29-kilometer medium-capacity system linking Tucheng (土城), Sansia (三峽)
RSS