The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) legislative caucus yesterday urged a temporary halt to all construction along railway lines nationwide and for the Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) to carry out substantial reform.
The call came after Taroko Express No. 408 collided with a crane truck, which slid down a hill onto the tracks, as it was entering the Cingshuei Tunnel (清水隧道) in Hualien County’s Sioulin Township (秀林) on Friday last week, killing 50 people and injuring 200.
Lee Yi-hsiang (李義祥), the driver of the crane truck and supervisor of the construction site next to the railway line, was detained on Monday.
Photo: CNA
TPP caucus convener Andy Chiu (邱臣遠) said that several train accidents have occurred in the past few years, including the major derailment of a Puyuma Express train in Yilan County in 2018, which caused 18 deaths.
After the Puyuma derailment, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) pledged “there would be no limit to the TRA’s reform,” and that personnel training, error-proofing mechanisms and hardware must be improved to ensure safe operations, but none of these promises have been fulfilled, Chiu said.
The TPP is to establish a TRA reform supervision task force and invite specialists to advise on the issues facing the company, he said.
Last week’s accident highlighted five areas in which the TRA must improve, including allowing construction projects to be contracted and subcontracted without effective project management, and allowing people and vehicles to enter construction sites that were supposed to be closed over the long weekend, Chiu said.
Other errors included not erecting barriers at the construction site above the railway line, projects not undergoing external review to avoid safety blind spots, and not knowing that it was illegal for Lee to be both the owner of the contracted company and site supervisor, he said.
The TPP urges the TRA to halt all construction projects alongside railway lines pending a thorough safety review, set up intrusion detection and disaster warning systems on railway lines within two years, and to implement a transportation safety management system, he added.
Meanwhile, lawmakers yesterday passed a TPP resolution requiring the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to present a plan for the improved supervision of the TRA within one month.
The resolution also stipulates that contractors with poor records are to be excluded from bidding for TRA projects, including those that change their name after a failed bid.
WANG RELEASED: A police investigation showed that an organized crime group allegedly taught their clients how to pretend to be sick during medical exams Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) and 11 others were released on bail yesterday, after being questioned for allegedly dodging compulsory military service or forging documents to help others avoid serving. Wang, 33, was catapulted into stardom for his role in the coming-of-age film Our Times (我的少女時代). Lately, he has been focusing on developing his entertainment career in China. The New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office last month began investigating an organized crime group that is allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified documents. Police in New Taipei City Yonghe Precinct at the end of last month arrested the main suspect,
A cat named Mikan (蜜柑) has brought in revenue of more than NT$10 million (US$305,390) for the Kaohsiung MRT last year. Mikan, born on April 4, 2020, was a stray cat before being adopted by personnel of Kaohsiung MRT’s Ciaotou Sugar Refinery Station. Mikan was named after a Japanese term for mandarin orange due to his color and because he looks like an orange when curled up. He was named “station master” of Ciaotou Sugar Refinery Station in September 2020, and has since become famous. With Kaohsiung MRT’s branding, along with the release of a set of cultural and creative products, station master Mikan
LITTORAL REGIMENTS: The US Marine Corps is transitioning to an ‘island hopping’ strategy to counterattack Beijing’s area denial strategy The US Marine Corps (USMC) has introduced new anti-drone systems to bolster air defense in the Pacific island chain amid growing Chinese military influence in the region, The Telegraph reported on Sunday. The new Marine Air Defense Integrated System (MADIS) Mk 1 is being developed to counter “the growing menace of unmanned aerial systems,” it cited the Marine Corps as saying. China has constructed a powerful defense mechanism in the Pacific Ocean west of the first island chain by deploying weapons such as rockets, submarines and anti-ship missiles — which is part of its anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) strategy against adversaries — the
Eleven people, including actor Darren Wang (王大陸), were taken into custody today for questioning regarding the evasion of compulsory military service and document forgery, the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said. Eight of the people, including Wang, are suspected of evading military service, while three are suspected of forging medical documents to assist them, the report said. They are all being questioned by police and would later be transferred to the prosecutors’ office for further investigation. Three men surnamed Lee (李), Chang (張) and Lin (林) are suspected of improperly assisting conscripts in changing their military classification from “stand-by
RSS