A project to reconstruct a building in Taipei city that was toppled during the 921 Earthquake was completed yesterday, weeks ahead of the 10th anniversary of the disaster.
Former residents of the Tunghsing Building (東星大樓) gathered in the lobby of the reconstructed complex for a cocktail party yesterday, in anticipation of their return home.
However, the residents will have to wait three months before they can move in, as the paperwork has yet to be completed.
PHOTO: CHIEN JUNG-FONG, TAIPEI TIMES
Lin Chung-huan (林崇煥), director of the Urban Redevelopment Office at the Taipei City government, said that despite the many twists and turns in the reconstruction process, the city took many steps to facilitate the project.
The 12-story Tunghsing Building fell when a 7.6 magnitude earthquake struck central Taiwan on Sept. 21, 1999. Eighty-seven residents of the building were killed, 105 injured and more than 250 left homeless in the collapse. It was the only building in Taipei City to be completely destroyed by the earthquake, which was centered about 200km outside the city.
The Taipei City Government has since refused to admit responsibility for the collapse and had engaged in a legal battle with former residents.
The project, which did not start until 2004, was suspended in October 2006 as a result of a financial crisis faced by the contractor.
The project was taken over by another contractor in August last year, but it came to standstill again two months later because of a similar problem.
The building was completed by a third contractor, which took over the project in December.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
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