Nantou County granted historical heritage status to the ruins of a temple that collapsed during the Jiji earthquake on Sept. 21, 1999, it said yesterday.
The Old Wuchang Temple ruins in Jiji Township (集集) became a recognized county-level heritage site following a review by a panel of experts on Sept. 8, a decision that was finalized on Oct. 27, the Nantou Cultural Affairs Bureau said in a statement.
The quake measuring magnitude 7.6 killed 2,456 people and injured 10,718, while 53,661 houses were destroyed and nearly as many houses damaged, with repair costs estimated at NT$300 billion (US$9.32 billion).
Photo courtesy of the Nantou County Cultural Affairs Bureau
The ruins of the old shrine — which lie beside a rebuilt Wuchang Temple — were left untouched after the collapse, making the wreck a memento of a major historical event that should be preserved for posterity, the bureau said.
The remains of the temple are the only preserved ruins that exist from the quake, it added.
The temple’s construction method and architecture were not created to withstand powerful quakes, which makes the ruins valuable for educational purposes, it said.
The ruined structure displays the classical traits of traditional Taiwanese Taoist-style temples, including undulating roof tiles, water channels and other decorative elements that were brought to eye level for viewing by the building’s fall, it said.
Construction of the temple began in 1991, the year after a man named Huang Chao-tieh (黃朝瓞) donated the lot to honor the Taoist deity Xuantian Shangdi (玄天上帝), the bureau’s records show.
Huang oversaw the building of the temple, which was nearly complete when the quake struck.
FINAL COUNTDOWN: About 50,000 attended a pro-recall rally yesterday, while the KMT and the TPP plan to rally against the recall votes today Democracy activists, together with arts and education representatives, yesterday organized a motorcade, while thousands gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei in the evening in support of tomorrow’s recall votes. Recall votes for 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers and suspended Hsinchu City mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) are to be held tomorrow, while recall votes for seven other KMT lawmakers are scheduled for Aug. 23. The afternoon motorcade was led by the Spring Breeze Culture and Arts Foundation, the Tyzen Hsiao Foundation and the Friends of Lee Teng-hui Association, and was joined by delegates from the Taiwan Statebuilding Party and the Taiwan Solidarity
Instead of threatening tariffs on Taiwan-made chips, the US should try to reinforce cooperation with Taiwan on semiconductor development to take on challenges from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), a Taiwanese think tank said. The administration of US President Donald Trump has threatened to impose across-the-board import duties of 32 percent on Taiwan-made goods and levy a separate tariff on semiconductors, which Taiwan is hoping to avoid. The Research Institute for Democracy, Society, and Emerging Technology (DSET), a National Science and Technology Council think tank, said that US efforts should focus on containing China’s semiconductor rise rather than impairing Taiwan. “Without
An SOS message in a bottle has been found in Ireland that is believed to have come from the Taiwanese captain of fishing vessel Yong Yu Sing No. 18 (永裕興18號), who has been missing without a trace for over four years, along with nine Indonesian crew members. The vessel, registered to Suao (蘇澳), went missing near Hawaii on Dec. 30, 2020. The ship has since been recovered, but the 10 crew members have never been found. The captain, surnamed Lee (李), is believed to have signed the note with his name. A post appeared on Reddit on Tuesday after a man
President William Lai (賴清德) today condemned an alleged attempt by two Chinese to snatch a letter of congratulations handed to Taiwan’s taekwondo team after they won silver at the Summer World University Games in Essen, Germany, yesterday. A Chinese man and woman reportedly tried to snatch a congratulatory letter to athletes Hung Jiun-yi (洪俊義), Jung Jiun-jie (鍾俊傑) and Huang Cho-cheng (黃卓乘) from the Ministry of Education, and then argued with media employees. “Why are you taking our things?” the media employees asked. “Does that say Chinese Taipei?” the two Chinese reportedly said. Following the incident, Sports Administration Director-General Cheng Shih-chung (鄭世忠) wrote on
RSS