■ SHIPPING
Whirlpool behind sinking?
A Panama-registered ship may have sunk in a whirlpool last Tuesday, dragging down as many as 27 crew members within five minutes after the freighter was struck by a giant wave off the northern coast, the Coast Guard Administration said yesterday. The ship was carrying iron ore and an Indonesian crew of 28. One crew member was found alive, clinging to his life vest, on Wednesday. "A whirlpool effect is possible," a coast guard spokesman said after hearing the survivor's account. "Some of the sailors couldn't put on their lifejackets in time, so there are some who didn't make it up." Although the coast guard normally calls off searches within 72 hours, it has extended its hunt for the ship to a seventh day, using 12 boats and a helicopter.
■ WEATHER
Low temperatures forecast
Temperatures will fall today as the seasonal wind from the northeast gets stronger, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. The bureau said a cold front is expected to arrive on Saturday. Forecaster Hsiao Chia-sen (蕭家森) said the weather in the north and northeastern regions started to become cool and humid yesterday. He said showers may occur in the north, northeast and the east of the nation. Temperatures are likely to rise tomorrow as the seasonal wind is likely to weaken, he said.
■ CROSS-STRAIT TIES
New Kinmen group planned
Civic activists on Kinmen will form an association to provide emergency disaster relief and first aid services across the Taiwan Strait, former Kinmen deputy commissioner Yen Ta-jen (顏達仁) said yesterday. He said the association was needed because of the growing amount of cross-strait boat travel between Kinmen and Xiamen in China. He said the group would provide assistance to people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. Yen said the association would be established before the end of this month. Kinmen County Commissioner Lee Chu-feng (李柱烽) supports the group, he said. An initial meeting of the association was heldon Sunday at the Hongbo Ceramics Factory, he said. "As direct shipping services between Kinmen and Fujian have become more popular, civic groups need to establish an emergency disaster relief and medical service," he said, adding that he believes the government will ease its policy on cross-strait travel. The number of people traveling between the two sides of the Strait was expected to increase to between 1 million and 2 million per year, Lee said. The new group would work with the Kinmen County Red Cross Organization and the Kinmen-Matsu Cross-Strait Interaction Association to provide emergency services, he said.
■ RESEARCH
Healthy hosiery invented
Industrial Technology Research Institute staffers have invented stockings that can repel mosquitos and socks that reduce the chance of developing a fungal infection, the institute said yesterday. "The stockings release an odor that repels mosquitos, but human beings cannot notice the smell. So women get fewer mosquito bites," a researcher said. The key was adding mosquito repellent during the dyeing process, he said. The institute has also invented socks which can reduce the chance of developing "Hong Kong foot." "We add an anti-bacterial agent into the material of the socks ... during the dyeing process. The agent restrains the growth of mildew and bacteria," he said.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
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