AVIATION
CAL flight turns back
A China Airlines flight with about 300 passengers on board had to turn around and return to Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport yesterday morning after an engine malfunction. Flight 100 took off from Taoyuan at 9:25am en route to Tokyo’s Narita International Airport. The pilot detected an error signal on one of the engines about 30 minutes after takeoff and decided to return to Taoyuan after failing to fix the problem. The plane landed safely at 10:27am. The airline arranged for the 296 passengers on board to fly on another aircraft, which departed at 1:30pm. Passengers in the Airbus 330-300 said in interviews on TVBS cable network they heard a loud boom and could smell burning plastic. CAL said it would conduct further inspections to determine the cause of the problem.
CULTURE
Ma to give special coins
The red envelopes President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) will be handing out for the Lunar New Year holiday will have different elements to welcome the Year of Rabbit: two NT$1 coins rather than coin-shape chocolates. Presidential Office spokesman Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) said Ma and Vice President Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) would begin distributing the red envelopes on Lunar New Year’s Eve, which falls on Feb. 2. Lo said they had 200,000 enveloopes in stock, which cost about NT$1 million (US$34,100) to produce, including the cost of the coins. As the coins are real, Lo urged parents to remind their young children not to eat them. The special design was ordered by Ma to mark the centenary of the Republic of China, Lo said.
WEATHER
Cold snap hits north
Temperatures in northern parts of the country could drop to 10oC today after a strong cold air mass arrived over the weekend, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. The bureau also issued low temperature alerts for residents living in coastal areas north of Hsinchu County, as well as the outlying islands of Kinmen and Matsu. Daytime temperatures yesterday were between 14oC and 15oC in the north, while the central parts of the nation experienced temperatures in the high teens and low-20s in the south. The lowest temperature was reported early yesterday morning in Hsinchu, with the mercury sliding to 10.8oC. The bureau added that it might snow on Hehuanshan (合歡山) today. The strong cold air mass could start weakening by tomorrow. Temperatures will drop again on Friday when another cold wave is expected to hit the nation.
TRANSPORT
City to manage bike stands
The Taipei City Government yesterday said it would begin systematically managing 2,000 bicycle stands this year to address the parking needs of the growing number of riders who commute or get around on their bikes. The Parking Management and Development Office said it planned to put more spaces for bicycles on the side of roads as part of the project, but would also gradually increase the number of bicycle parking lots. One goal is to increase parking capacity near public transport hubs to make it easier for bike riders to take advantage of the MRT system’s expanding mixed-mode commuting network. Effectively managing those parking lots will be just as important as building them if the bicycle-MRT commuting option catches on, officials said. One new parking lot built last year near the MRT Technology Building Station, with a capacity of 655 bicycles, has already reduced bike parking violations and bicycle theft, the city said.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
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