Leaders of Taiwan's biggest government-run industries were cautious yesterday about guaranteeing a trouble-free Y2K transition -- despite three years of preparation and billions of dollars spent to avert a possible emergency, which had allowed the island to lay claim to being the first Asian nation to complete Y2K preparedness.
"I would advise anyone wishing to fly to buy insurance ... I always do when I fly," Civil Aeronautics Administration (
Taiwan's air transport system was particularly vulnerable to possible computer malfunctions due to the Y2K bug, Shen added.
"All air traffic control systems and airlines work on Greenwich mean time, so we won't be able to see what sort of Y2K problems occur in New Zealand and Australia, which are ahead of us in seeing in the New Year," she said.
Y2K bugs were found in Taiwan's aging air traffic control system, bought from US carrier United Airlines, though the system was overhauled and passed a Y2K test on Feb. 10, Shen said.
Airlines will be doubling staff Dec. 31 to Jan. 1 to deal with delays or possible emergencies, and Taiwan's airports have all been rated Y2K compliant by global aerospace conglomerates Airbus and Boeing. Emergency procedures include diverting all traffic to one air corridor to allow a single flight lane for airplanes that have reported malfunctions.
In a separate meeting to discuss Y2K, government officials raised doubts about the Y2K readiness of the Phillipines' air traffic control system and infrastructure, saying it was the least prepared in Asia.
Jess Chen, General Manager of Financial Information Service, reiterated recent calls for calm and urged the public to rush now rather than later to automatic cash dispensers to avert a crisis.
"We have 30 million bank cashcards in circulation in Taiwan ... and we're worried about a possible overload of transactions. So I'm asking anyone who wants to take their money out of the bank to do it from now until the 31st, not to wait until the last day," he said, citing officials' fears that system halts due to an overload of transactions could fuel Y2K panic.
Spokesmen for two of the nation's three biggest monopolies -- Taiwan Power Co and Chunghwa Telecom -- said their organizations were the key to overcoming an emergency but were cautious about ruling out power and communications failures such as the ones that occurred after the September 21 quake.
"As we saw from the quake, if there's no power then nothing works ... To avoid the same problems with the power supplied from the south to the north, we'll be running every region as an independent unit," Taiwan Power Co Deputy Director Charlie Xu (
"We and the other government bodies have spent billions of NT dollars and have been preparing for it since mid-1987 ... But I can't guarantee there won't be any failures," he added.
TaiPower had to overhaul or replace over 900 computers to become Y2K compliant and had completed Y2K compliance procedures in 4,000 related organizations, Xu said.
Chunghwa Telecom Deputy Director Chang Feng-hsiong (
"But we're most worried that if people get an engaged tone they'll think its Y2K. The system was overloaded last New Year for the first time and it may well happen again this year," Chang said.
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