■ EARTHQUAKES
Quake causes train stoppage
An earthquake measuring 4.6 on the Richter scale struck central and southern Taiwan at 11:36am yesterday, but no immediate damage was reported. The Central Weather Bureau said the epicenter of the earthquake was located 16km south of Chiayi City at a depth of 11km. Although the quake had a magnitude of only 1 in Kaohsiung City, the Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp temporarily suspended service from Kaohsiung to Taichung City as a precautionary measure. The company canceled two trains after the quake struck and stopped selling tickets for about 80 minutes. Ticket windows resumed normal operations at 12:55pm. The quake had an intensity of 2 in Chiayi City and Tainan City. An earthquake measuring 6.4 struck Chiayi on the same day 10 years ago, with seven houses destroyed at that time.
■ MEDICINE
Doctor investigated
A doctor at a clinic in Sanchong (三重), Taipei County, came under investigation by prosecutors yesterday after local health authorities accused him of dereliction of duty in a fatal case of influenza A(H1N1) involving a 39-year-old woman. Relatives of the woman accused the attending doctor, surnamed Tan (譚), of failing to administer proper treatment after she tested positive for A(H1N1) at the clinic on Oct. 13. She was diagnosed two days after she developed a fever and a cough, but instead of being treated with anti-viral medication, she was given four bags of intravenous fluid on Tan旧 orders. The doctor said the clinic had not been supplied with the anti-viral drug Tamiflu, Yang said. The woman was transferred to an intensive care unit last Friday after it was confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control that she had contracted A(H1N1). She died on Tuesday.
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm early yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, less than a week after a typhoon barreled across the nation. The agency issued an advisory at 3:30am stating that the 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, of the Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, with a 100km radius. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA
Residents have called on the Taipei City Government to reconsider its plan to demolish a four-decades-old pedestrian overpass near Daan Forest Park. The 42-year-old concrete and steel structure that serves as an elevated walkway over the intersection of Heping and Xinsheng roads is to be closed on Tuesday in preparation for demolition slated for completion by the end of the month. However, in recent days some local residents have been protesting the planned destruction of the intersection overpass that is rendered more poetically as “sky bridge” in Chinese. “This bridge carries the community’s collective memory,” said a man surnamed Chuang
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm earlier today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, in this year's Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am, the CWA said. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) with a 100km radius, it said. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA meteorologist Huang En-hung (黃恩宏) said. However, a more accurate forecast would be made on Wednesday, when Yinxing is
NEW DESTINATIONS: Marketing campaigns to attract foreign travelers have to change from the usual promotions about Alishan and Taroko Gorge, the transport minister said The number of international tourists visiting Taiwan is estimated to top 8 million by the end of this year, Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shi-kai (陳世凱) said yesterday, adding that the ministry has not changed its goal of attracting 10 million foreign travelers this year. Chen made the remarks at a meeting of the legislature’s Transportation Committee to brief lawmakers about the ministry’s plan to boost foreign visitor arrivals. Last month, Chen told the committee that the nation might attract only 7.5 million tourists from overseas this year and that when the ministry sets next year’s goal, it would not include