SEISMOLOGY
Temblor strikes off Hualien
A magnitude 5.5 earthquake struck off Hualien County at 4:26pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter was at sea, 8.5km southeast of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 23.9km, CWA data showed. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a seismic event, was highest in Hualien and parts of Nantou County, where it measured 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured 3 in parts of Yilan County, Taichung and Changhua County, CWA data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries following the quake, which the CWA said was an aftershock of the earthquake measuring 7.2 on the Richter scale that rocked the Hualien area on April 3.
Photo courtesy of the New Taipei Kings
SPORTS
Lin re-signs with Kings
Former NBA star Jeremy Lin (林書豪) has exercised a one-year option with the New Taipei Kings and would play with the team in the Taiwan Professional Basketball League’s (TPBL) inaugural 2024-2025 season. Lin made the announcement yesterday via his Instagram account, saying he was “re-signing with the Kings” and excited to play alongside his younger brother and other teammates. Last year, Lin signed a one-year deal with the Kings with an option for a second year. “As the saying goes, getting to the top isn’t easy, staying there’s even harder. It won’t be easy defending the title, but we’re excited for the challenge,” Lin wrote.
EDUCATION
Youth phone use high: poll
More than 85 percent of Taiwanese senior-high school students use social media, while cellphone and computer games were the most popular devices for Internet use by students at lower levels, a survey released yesterday showed. The survey, commissioned by the Ministry of Education and conducted in March to April last year by National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University’s Research Center of Humanities and Social Sciences, was based on 4,937 responses from students in elementary school grades 4 to 6, junior-high school (grades 7 to 9) and senior-high school (grades 10 to 12). It found that 59.7 percent of elementary-school students had a smartphone, compared with 87 percent of junior-high students and 91.8 percent of senior-high school students. In response to the survey results, the ministry said it had developed a program in 2019 to promote media and digital literacy education for elementary and junior-high school students. The program — a subsidized three-year pilot version of which was launched at 18 schools in 2022 — aims to help young students evaluate sources of information, develop healthy social media habits and avoid online fraud and bullying, it said.
CULTURE
‘Sounding Light’ premieres
Cloud Gate Dance Theatre held an overseas premiere of the nature-inspired 2020 work Sounding Light (定光) during a tour in Germany, which concluded in Dresden on Saturday evening, local time. Sounding Light, one of four works by Cloud Gate artistic director Cheng Tsung-lung (鄭宗龍) that the dance troupe plans to present to overseas audiences this year, was staged at the Hellerau-European Centre for the Arts in Dresden. The acclaimed dance troupe first performed Sounding Light at the Festival Kunstfest Weimar on Aug. 24. The two-city tour in Germany marked Cloud Gate’s first performance in Weimar in 21 years.
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