A body part recovered recently from waters below the Suhua Highway has been confirmed to be that of a Chinese tourist who was killed in an accident on the roadway as the result of rains from a recent typhoon, the Yilan District Prosecutors’ Office said yesterday.
The body part discovered by the navy’s underwater operations team in the waters below the Suhua Highway’s 114.5km marker on Nov. 4 was confirmed through DNA testing to belong to Guang Shuilai (關水來), the prosecutors’ office said in a statement.
Guang was one of two Chinese citizens confirmed to have died in the Suhua Highway disaster that occurred Oct. 21 when rains during Typhoon Megi triggered lethal landslides that brought down several sections of the road.
Eighteen other Chinese tourists remain missing after their two buses had accidents on the highway during the storm.
In related news, the family of a Taiwanese driver who died trying to save the lives of 20 passengers in the Suhua Highway tragedy last month accepted a medal and NT$2.1 million (US$69,400) in donations on Thursday in recognition of his courage.
Tsai Chih-ming’s (蔡智明) wife, who held their youngest child throughout the ceremony, said she appreciated the goodwill shown by the public.
Tsai encountered a bus that was buried by a landslide on the Suhua Highway during the heavy rains on Oct. 21 and created an escape passage for the Chinese tourists who were traveling on the bus.
However, Tsai could not escape as giant rocks hit the tour bus soon after the passengers had been safely evacuated.
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
NUMBERs IMBALANCE: More than 4 million Taiwanese have visited China this year, while only about half a million Chinese have visited here Beijing has yet to respond to Taiwan’s requests for negotiation over matters related to the recovery of cross-strait tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. Taiwan’s tourism authority issued the statement after Chinese-language daily the China Times reported yesterday that the government’s policy of banning group tours to China does not stop Taiwanese from visiting the country. As of October, more than 4.2 million had traveled to China this year, exceeding last year. Beijing estimated the number of Taiwanese tourists in China could reach 4.5 million this year. By contrast, only 500,000 Chinese tourists are expected in Taiwan, the report said. The report
RSS