The day after a two-seater fighter jet disappeared last week during a routine military training mission over the Taiwan Strait, debris and body parts were found, but authorities are at a loss to explain what happened.
The crash on Oct. 20 revived decades-old rumors: Are the Penghu islands the Bermuda Triangle of Asia?
“The Bermuda terror,” a headline in the Chinese-language United Evening News read. “Three hundred dead or missing in 40 years.”
PHOTO: JEROME FAVRE, AP
Cable news stations aired grisly images of earlier plane crashes in the area, sparking debate in Internet chat rooms. The reports prompted Penghu officials to issue a statement disputing the Bermuda Triangle comparison, which they fear might scare away investors in a casino resort and other projects.
Experts dismiss the idea, as well as speculation that an irregular magnetic field affects navigation instruments.
Scientists have found nothing abnormal in the area, said Chen Wen-shan (陳文山), a geologist at National Taiwan University.
The pristine waters around the Penghu islands have seen their fair share of crashes.
Government records show at least three commercial planes, one civilian helicopter and five fighter jets have crashed in the area in the past two decades.
Several spy planes reportedly went down or were reported missing while flying missions to China during the Cold War in the 1960s and 1970s. The military refuses to confirm the reports, saying most of the documents remain classified.
The deadliest accident came in May 2002, when a China Airlines flight to Hong Kong broke up over waters north of Penghu, killing all 225 on board.
Seven months later, a cargo plane crashed in the same area.
The back-to-back crashes bolstered the Bermuda Triangle speculation so much that tourists all but shunned Penghu in the following months.
So far, the latest fighter jet crash has not rekindled as many jitters among the public, much to the relief of local officials.
Penghu County Commissioner Wang Chien-fa (王乾發) blames the accidents on the high volume of air traffic, saying most of the mishaps have been shown to be the result of human or mechanical failure.
“With so many aircraft flying over our airspace everyday, the chances of crashes are proportionally higher, and that's all,” he said in a telephone interview.
Yuan Hsiao-feng (袁曉峰), an aviation expert at National Cheng Kung University, pointed to the high risks of undertaking military training flights.
Ending a summer season that drew thousands of swimmers to its beaches, the island chain of 90,000 people is now getting ready to welcome windsurfers.
Tourism officials also hope that Penghu will benefit from a recent relaxing of travel restrictions for Chinese who want to visit Taiwan.
The islands, first settled by shipwrecked Chinese sailors 700 years ago, have an undersea ancient wall and other ruins. They are also an attraction because they were once at the forefront of the bitter Taiwan-China military standoff, tourism official Hung Tung-lin (洪棟霖) said.
The islands have long been seen as mysterious because of their inaccessibility and a past history of shipwrecks, he said.
South of Penghu, an area called the “Ditch of Black Waters” is a graveyard for numerous boats, said to have capsized in swirling seas during the height of Chinese immigration to Taiwan two to three centuries ago.
Japanese pilots and sailors are said to have avoided rough seas off Penghu, which was known to them as the “Devil's Sea,” when Japan ruled Taiwan.
Today, trawlers and cargo ships sail through the region safely.
“The mystic perception is fine but we hope people will not associate this area with danger,” Hung said.
Foreign tourists who purchase a seven-day Taiwan Pass are to get a second one free of charge as part of a government bid to boost tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. A pair of Taiwan Passes is priced at NT$5,000 (US$156.44), an agency staff member said, adding that the passes can be used separately. The pass can be used in many of Taiwan’s major cities and to travel to several tourist resorts. It expires seven days after it is first used. The pass is a three-in-one package covering the high-speed rail system, mass rapid transport (MRT) services and the Taiwan Tourist Shuttle services,
Drinking a lot of water or milk would not help a person who has ingested terbufos, a toxic chemical that has been identified as the likely cause of three deaths, a health expert said yesterday. An 83-year-old woman surnamed Tseng (曾) and two others died this week after eating millet dumplings with snails that Tseng had made. Tseng died on Tuesday and others ate the leftovers when they went to her home to mourn her death that evening. Twelve people became ill after eating the dumplings following Tseng’s death. Their symptoms included vomiting and convulsions. Six were hospitalized, with two of them
DIVA-READY: The city’s deadline for the repairs is one day before pop star Jody Chiang is to perform at the Taipei Dome for the city’s Double Ten National Day celebrations The Taipei City Government has asked Farglory Group (遠雄集團) to repair serious water leaks in the Taipei Dome before Friday next week, Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said yesterday, following complaints that many areas at the stadium were leaking during two baseball games over the weekend. The dome on Saturday and Sunday hosted two games in tribute to CTBC Brothers’ star Chou Szu-chi (周思齊) ahead of his retirement from the CPBL. The games each attracted about 40,000 people, filling the stadium to capacity. However, amid heavy rain, many people reported water leaking on some seats, at the entrance and exit areas, and the
BIG collection: The herbarium holds more than 560,000 specimens, from the Japanese colonial period to the present, including the Wulai azalea, which is now extinct in the wild The largest collection of plant specimens in Taiwan, the Taipei Botanical Garden’s herbarium, is celebrating its 100th anniversary with an exhibition that opened on Friday. The herbarium provides critical historical documents for botanists and is the first of its kind in Taiwan, Taiwan Forestry Research Institute director Tseng Yen-hsueh (曾彥學) said. It is housed in a two-story red brick building, which opened during 1924. At the time, it stored 30,000 plant specimens from almost 6,000 species, including Taiwanese plant samples collected by Tomitaro Makino, the “father of Japanese botany,” Tseng said. The herbarium collection has grown in the century since its