Three ninth-graders were killed and 38 other people injured when their tour bus was hit by a train at a railway crossing in Yingke, Taipei County, yesterday morning.
"A southbound train going 73kph crashed into a Lung Mao Co bus at 7:38am," said Hsu Ta-wen (
The bus had been unable to make it through the intersection because it could not pass a truck that was on the other side of the tracks and the driver could not reverse his vehicle because 11 other tour buses were lined up behind him.
PHOTO: LIN CHENG-KUN, TAIPEI TIMES
The ninth-graders and their teachers had been headed to Kenting for a three-day graduation trip.
According to Hsu, the TRA had previously said the Yingke crossing was unsafe and in need of reconstruction. He said 16 people were injured in a similar accident at the intersection on July 20.
According to Hsu, the Yinge rail crossing was equipped with three different safety mechanisms -- a warning siren, a crossbar that comes down as a train approaches and an emergency button to notify train drivers of an obstructed crossing -- all of which were in working order.
The TRA installed the emergency buttons in June 2001 in an effort to make rail crossings safer. When the button is pressed, the train driver will be notified as far as 800m from a rail crossing.
Hsu said the emergency button at the Yingke crossing had not been pushed yesterday morning, leaving the train driver unaware of the situation until approximately 50m from the bus.
"The train would have needed 270m to come to a complete stop," he said.
Hsu said the TRA had asked the local government to changes to the crossing after the July accident because the roadway that crosses the rail tracks is too narrow and curves to one side.
"The Ministry of Transportation and Communications had set aside NT$15.8 million in July to subsidize the local government's reconstruction of the intersection," he said.
Hsu said the reconstruction project would widen the road from 8.4m to 20m and widen the intersection from 9.6m to 27m. He promised that a contractor would be found for the job by the end of the month, but he didn't say when work would begin.
TRA official Chen Shih-chang (
"The government has spent roughly NT$1.3 billion on similar construction in the past decade," Chen said.
Meanwhile, Premier Yu Shyi-kun ordered government agencies to issue compensation to the families of the victims.
"The premier learned of the tragedy soon after the accident took place. He then instructed the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Transportation and Communications to handle the matter appropriately in accordance with related regulations," Cabinet Spokesman Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said at a press conference yesterday afternoon.
Lin also conveyed the premier's regrets over the accident.
The TRA said that should police investigations determine that the agency was at fault in yesterday's accident, it is prepared to pay NT$20,000 compensation to the families of the students who died and NT$6,000 to those who were injured.
The accident caused delays to 34 trains and 20,000 passengers. Officials say normal rail operations were resumed at 1:16pm.
additional reporting by Ko Shu-ling
NATIONAL SECURITY: Authorities are working to confirm the identities of the military personnel involved and investigating possible illegal conduct and regulatory violations Authorities are probing possible national security implications after Kinmen police and immigration officers on Sunday found a Chinese woman allegedly posing as a tourist while engaging in prostitution involving more than 10 military personnel. The woman, surnamed Chen (陳), has since been deported, authorities said, adding that investigators are still working to confirm the identities of those implicated, as the records only listed code names and aliases. The case stemmed from a report received by the Kinmen District Prosecutors’ Office on Friday last week from the Jinhu Precinct of the Kinmen County Police Bureau. On Sunday, police, along with the National Immigration
GLOBALGIVING: ‘ Caving to external pressure is not acceptable for an organization that has cultivated justice reform and human rights for 30 years,’ one NGO said A slew of non-government organizations (NGOs) have withdrawn from the GlobalGiving fundraising platform after it announced it would use “Chinese Taipei” instead of “Taiwan” from next month. The Taiwan Good Rice Association wrote on Facebook on Friday that it was informed on April 28 via a teleconference call of the change, which was made because the platform wanted to operate in China. Taiwan Good Rice is to terminate all cooperative relationships with GlobalGiving in response to the platform’s “unilateral and non-negotiable” decision to remove references to Taiwan, the NGO said. “Taiwan is in the official name of Taiwan Good Rice Association and the
HEAVY WEATHER: Typhoon Jangmi is due to crash straight into the Ryukyus as airlines look to shift flights to larger aircraft or cancel flights to Okinawa entirely Taiwan’s international air carriers announced flight adjustments over the weekend as Typhoon Jangmi is forecast to hit the Ryukyu Islands today and tomorrow. The Central Weather Administration (CWA) upgraded Jangmi from a tropical storm to a typhoon at 8am yesterday, with the eye located 580km south of Naha city. It was moving north at 19kph. Today, China Airlines’ CI-120, CI-121, CI-122 and CI-123 flights between Taoyuan and Naha, Okinawa, have been canceled as well as CI-132 and CI-133 between Kaohsiung and Naha. EVA Air’s BR-112, BR-113, BR-186 and BR-185 flights between Taoyuan and Naha are also canceled. Low-cost carrier Tigerair Taiwan canceled IT-230,
MULTIPRONGED APPROACH: China has sought to pressure Palau across a number of fronts, but the island nation has staunchly resisted overtures to ditch Taiwan Palau has been firm in backing Taiwan despite Chinese pressure that uses tourism economics, cyberattacks and criminal infiltration as tools to threaten the Pacific ally into renouncing its recognition of Taiwan as a sovereign state. The Presidential Office yesterday announced that Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) would visit Palau from Saturday to Wednesday next week at the invitation of Palauan President Surangel Whipps Jr. Whipps in April said in an interview that China had outspokenly asked Palau to “denounce Taiwan.” “And we have said: ‘We have no enemies, but nobody tells us who our friends are,’” he said. Whipps has told reporters multiple times
RSS