LOTTERY
Lottery prizes top NT$1bn
Taiwan Lottery yesterday announced that it is give out prizes worth NT$1.05 billion (US$31.88 million) for the Lunar New Year. That would be a record high for the Lunar New Year lottery. Prizes are to be drawn daily over 20 days, from Jan. 24 to Feb. 12, Taiwan Lottery president Hsieh Chih-hung (謝志宏) said. The lotteries include the Lotto 6/49, Daily Cash, 39Mark5, 49Mark6, Pick 3, Pick 4 and Bingo Bingo, he said. The top prize for Lotto 6/49, in which buyers have to pick six numbers from 49 numbers, is to be NT$100 million, Hsieh said. Those who pick six out of the nine numbers drawn for the Lunar New Year’s Big Red Envelope would have a chance to win up to NT$1 million from a total prize pot of NT$480 million, he said. Those who match five out of nine numbers and pick the correct number for the Lunar New Year’s Small Red Envelope draw would have a chance to win up to NT$100,000 from a total prize pot of NT$80 million, he added. Additionally, the prizes for Bingo Bingo, in which ticket buyers bet on numbers every five minutes, would be increased.
Photo: Fang Wei-chieh, Taipei Times
SOCIETY
Boat captain drowns at sea
The captain of the Pingtung County-registered Ying Feng 32 died after the vessel capsized yesterday morning. The Coast Guard Administration’s Southern Branch said that it received a report about the incident in waters northeast of Siaoliouciou Island (小琉球) at 7:58am, upon which it dispatched its PP-3557 and CP-1071 vessels to the area to provide assistance. The captain, a 66-year-old man surnamed Hung (洪), was found floating in the sea at 8:27am by the person who reported the incident, officials said. The CP-1071 recovered Hung’s body and an attempt to resuscitate him was made on the vessel, which arrived at Pingtung’s Yanpu Inspection Office at 9:05am. He was treated by medical personnel and taken to hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Hung went out to sea after reporting to the coast guard at the New Liuqiu Inspection Office at about 6am, the coast guard said.
TRANSPORTATION
More HSR trains added
Twelve additional high-speed rail services would be available during the Lunar New Year period to meet increased demand, with reservations to open tomorrow, Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) said yesterday. Three-hundred-and-eighty extra trains (205 southbound and 175 northbound) are to operate, in addition to the scheduled services between Jan. 23 and Feb. 3, bringing the total number of trains to 2,258, the operator said. THSRC urged people planning to travel north to book their tickets as early as possible, given that services between Jan. 31 and Feb. 2 have mostly sold out. To accommodate demand, the schedules for 18 northbound trains have been adjusted. Sixteen are to arrive after midnight, while two would depart earlier than originally scheduled. Meanwhile, 47 shuttle trains — 10 southbound and 37 northbound — are to operate in northern and central Taiwan between Nangang and Taichung stations. Each train is to have eight cars with non-reserved seating to help with the demand, it added. THSRC said it would provide real-time traffic updates through its online booking systems, such as T-EX App, Facebook Messenger and convenience store ticketing machines, among other platforms. As Feb. 8 is a makeup workday, two additional northbound trains (1504 and 1202) would be added, with ticket bookings available from today, the company said.
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
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
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IN FULL SWING: Recall drives against lawmakers in Hualien, Taoyuan and Hsinchu have reached the second-stage threshold, the campaigners said Campaigners in a recall petition against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) in Taichung yesterday said their signature target is within sight, and that they need a big push to collect about 500 more signatures from locals to reach the second-stage threshold. Recall campaigns against KMT lawmakers Johnny Chiang (江啟臣), Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔) and Lo Ting-wei (羅廷瑋) are also close to the 10 percent threshold, and campaigners are mounting a final push this week. They need about 800 signatures against Chiang and about 2,000 against Yang. Campaigners seeking to recall Lo said they had reached the threshold figure over the
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