The elevated section of Provincial Highway No. 1 from New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) to Taipei reopened to traffic after an incident involving a steel beam yesterday morning.
One of the two lanes affected reopened for traffic at about 11am after obstacles were removed, Sanchong police said.
The incident occurred at 5:50am when the steel beam fell from a flatbed trailer driven by a 34-year-old man surnamed Hung (洪) as the vehicle was traveling along the Zhongan Street section of the highway, causing severe traffic congestion and forcing authorities to close the road and redirect vehicles, police said.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
The steel beam broke through the guardrail and damaged parts of the highway when it fell.
Although it did not hit the ground below the elevated highway, debris hit two vehicles that were parked below, police said.
The damage stretched about 15m along the road, but no one was injured in the incident, they said.
The driver was not under the influence of alcohol, police added.
A preliminary assessment found that there were no major structural issues, New Taipei City Maintenance Office head Cheng Li-hui (鄭立輝) said.
However, there is a hole and steel reinforcing bars are protruding from the highway, Cheng said, adding that it would take about two months to repair.
A relatively large earthquake may strike within the next two weeks, following a magnitude 5.2 temblor that shook Taitung County this morning, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. An earthquake struck at 8:18am today 10.2km west of Taitung County Hall in Taitung City at a relatively shallow depth of 6.5km, CWA data showed. The largest intensity of 4 was felt in Taitung and Pingtung counties, which received an alert notice, while areas north of Taichung did not feel any shaking, the CWA said. The earthquake was the result of the collision between the Philippine Plate and the Eurasian Plate, the agency said, adding
Snow fell in the mountainous areas of northern, central and eastern Taiwan in the early hours of yesterday, as cold air currents moved south. In the northern municipality of Taoyuan, snow started falling at about 6am in Fusing District (復興), district head Su Tso-hsi (蘇佐璽) said. By 10am, Lalashan National Forest Recreation Area, as well as Hualing (華陵), Sanguang (三光) and Gaoyi (高義) boroughs had seen snowfall, Su said. In central Taiwan, Shei-Pa National Park in Miaoli County and Hehuanshan National Forest Recreation Area in Nantou County saw snowfall of 5cm and 6cm respectively, by 10am, staff at the parks said. It began snowing
The 2025 Kaohsiung Wonderland–Winter Amusement Park event has teamed up with the Japanese manga series Chiikawa this year for its opening at Love River Bay yesterday, attracting more than 10,000 visitors, the city government said. Following the success of the “2024 Kaohsiung Wonderland” collaboration with a giant inflatable yellow duck installation designed by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, this year the Kaohsiung Tourism Bureau collaborated with Chiikawa by Japanese illustrator Nagano to present two giant inflatable characters. Two inflatable floats — the main character, Chiikwa, a white bear-like creature with round ears, and Hachiware, a white cat with a blue-tipped tail
HOLIDAY EXERCISE: National forest recreation areas from north to south offer travelers a wide choice of sights to connect with nature and enjoy its benefits Hiking is a good way to improve one’s health, the Forestry and Nature Conservation Agency said, as it released a list of national forest recreation areas that travelers can visit during the Lunar New Year holiday. Taking a green shower of phytoncides in the woods could boost one’s immunity system and metabolism, agency Director-General Lin Hwa-ching (林華慶) cited a Japanese study as saying. For people visiting northern Taiwan, Lin recommended the Dongyanshan National Forest Recreation Area in Taoyuan’s Fusing District (復興). Once an important plantation in the north, Dongyanshan (東眼山) has a number of historic monuments, he said. The area is broadly covered by
RSS