An Internet celebrity from Taipei known for taking photographs of herself in a bikini after hiking up mountain peaks nationwide died on Monday from suspected hypothermia after a fall in central Taiwan, the Nantou County Fire Department said.
The body of the woman, identified as Gigi Wu (吳季芸), was found in a gorge in Penjushan (盆駒山) at about noon, but rescuers detected no signs of life by the time they reached her, Third Squadron head Lin Cheng-yi (林正宜) said.
Wu on Saturday called for assistance on her satellite phone, indicating that she was in distress and unable to move after falling into a 30m gorge at Penjushan.
Photo: Hsieh Chieh-yu, Taipei Times
However, weather conditions prevented the rescue team deployed to find Wu from using a helicopter, so they set out on foot.
Wu was found dead 43 hours after she made the distress call.
Rescuers were to transport her body to an open area for an airlift, the department said.
The Chinese-language Apple Daily reported that Wu entered Dongpu (東埔) in Nantou County on Jan. 11 and planned to hike the Batongguan Historic Trail (八通關古道) in Yushan National Park until tomorrow.
She apparently did not have a permit to hike the Yushan mountain range, the department said.
Wu, 36, gained fame online for hiking mountains nationwide and posting pictures on Facebook of herself in a bikini after completing a hike.
She had accumulated more than 14,000 followers.
In a televised interview in July last year, Wu said that the bikini shots came about a few years ago when she lost a bet to a friend and the punishment was to take pictures in a bikini after hiking up a mountain.
Wu said that she had completed 100 hikes and worn at least 97 bikinis over the past four years.
As news of her death spread, hundreds of followers began posting condolence messages on Wu’s Facebook page on Monday.
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday said it had deployed patrol vessels to expel a China Coast Guard ship and a Chinese fishing boat near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. The China Coast Guard vessel was 28 nautical miles (52km) northeast of Pratas at 6:15am on Thursday, approaching the island’s restricted waters, which extend 24 nautical miles from its shoreline, the CGA’s Dongsha-Nansha Branch said in a statement. The Tainan, a 2,000-tonne cutter, was deployed by the CGA to shadow the Chinese ship, which left the area at 2:39pm on Friday, the statement said. At 6:31pm on Friday,
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy’s (PLAN) third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, would pose a steep challenge to Taiwan’s ability to defend itself against a full-scale invasion, a defense expert said yesterday. Institute of National Defense and Security Research analyst Chieh Chung (揭仲) made the comment hours after the PLAN confirmed the carrier recently passed through the Taiwan Strait to conduct “scientific research tests and training missions” in the South China Sea. China has two carriers in operation — the Liaoning and the Shandong — with the Fujian undergoing sea trials. Although the PLAN needs time to train the Fujian’s air wing and
Taiwanese celebrities Hank Chen (陳漢典) and Lulu Huang (黃路梓茵) announced yesterday that they are planning to marry. Huang announced and posted photos of their engagement to her social media pages yesterday morning, joking that the pair were not just doing marketing for a new show, but “really getting married.” “We’ve decided to spend all of our future happy and hilarious moments together,” she wrote. The announcement, which was later confirmed by the talent agency they share, appeared to come as a surprise even to those around them, with veteran TV host Jacky Wu (吳宗憲) saying he was “totally taken aback” by the news. Huang,
The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) put Taiwan in danger, Ma Ying-jeou Foundation director Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑) said yesterday, hours after the de facto US embassy said that Beijing had misinterpreted World War II-era documents to isolate Taiwan. The AIT’s comments harmed the Republic of China’s (ROC) national interests and contradicted a part of the “six assurances” stipulating that the US would not change its official position on Taiwan’s sovereignty, Hsiao said. The “six assurances,” which were given by then-US president Ronald Reagan to Taiwan in 1982, say that Washington would not set a date for ending arm sales to Taiwan, consult
RSS