LOTTERY
Lottery prizes top NT$1bn
Taiwan Lottery yesterday announced that it is give out prizes worth NT$1.05 billion (US$31.88 million) for the Lunar New Year. That would be a record high for the Lunar New Year lottery. Prizes are to be drawn daily over 20 days, from Jan. 24 to Feb. 12, Taiwan Lottery president Hsieh Chih-hung (謝志宏) said. The lotteries include the Lotto 6/49, Daily Cash, 39Mark5, 49Mark6, Pick 3, Pick 4 and Bingo Bingo, he said. The top prize for Lotto 6/49, in which buyers have to pick six numbers from 49 numbers, is to be NT$100 million, Hsieh said. Those who pick six out of the nine numbers drawn for the Lunar New Year’s Big Red Envelope would have a chance to win up to NT$1 million from a total prize pot of NT$480 million, he said. Those who match five out of nine numbers and pick the correct number for the Lunar New Year’s Small Red Envelope draw would have a chance to win up to NT$100,000 from a total prize pot of NT$80 million, he added. Additionally, the prizes for Bingo Bingo, in which ticket buyers bet on numbers every five minutes, would be increased.
Photo: Fang Wei-chieh, Taipei Times
SOCIETY
Boat captain drowns at sea
The captain of the Pingtung County-registered Ying Feng 32 died after the vessel capsized yesterday morning. The Coast Guard Administration’s Southern Branch said that it received a report about the incident in waters northeast of Siaoliouciou Island (小琉球) at 7:58am, upon which it dispatched its PP-3557 and CP-1071 vessels to the area to provide assistance. The captain, a 66-year-old man surnamed Hung (洪), was found floating in the sea at 8:27am by the person who reported the incident, officials said. The CP-1071 recovered Hung’s body and an attempt to resuscitate him was made on the vessel, which arrived at Pingtung’s Yanpu Inspection Office at 9:05am. He was treated by medical personnel and taken to hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Hung went out to sea after reporting to the coast guard at the New Liuqiu Inspection Office at about 6am, the coast guard said.
TRANSPORTATION
More HSR trains added
Twelve additional high-speed rail services would be available during the Lunar New Year period to meet increased demand, with reservations to open tomorrow, Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) said yesterday. Three-hundred-and-eighty extra trains (205 southbound and 175 northbound) are to operate, in addition to the scheduled services between Jan. 23 and Feb. 3, bringing the total number of trains to 2,258, the operator said. THSRC urged people planning to travel north to book their tickets as early as possible, given that services between Jan. 31 and Feb. 2 have mostly sold out. To accommodate demand, the schedules for 18 northbound trains have been adjusted. Sixteen are to arrive after midnight, while two would depart earlier than originally scheduled. Meanwhile, 47 shuttle trains — 10 southbound and 37 northbound — are to operate in northern and central Taiwan between Nangang and Taichung stations. Each train is to have eight cars with non-reserved seating to help with the demand, it added. THSRC said it would provide real-time traffic updates through its online booking systems, such as T-EX App, Facebook Messenger and convenience store ticketing machines, among other platforms. As Feb. 8 is a makeup workday, two additional northbound trains (1504 and 1202) would be added, with ticket bookings available from today, the company said.
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
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