Guangfu flood death toll rises to 18. Six still missing.

Guangfu flood death toll rises to 18. Six still missing.

2025-09-29

The total death toll of last week’s flash flood in Hualien has gone up to 18. The number was updated on Monday morning by a search and rescue team from the Military’s Special Forces Command. The deceased was a farm worker in his 60s surnamed Tsai. His daughter thanked the rescue team, saying she was grateful that his body had finally been found.

A memorial service was held on Monday for the 17 victims identified previously, to mark the 7th day since their passing. Search efforts continue to find the remaining six people that are still missing. Currently, clearing debris, restoring homes and searching for the missing remain top priorities. Volunteers with shovels and heavy machinery operators have been hard at work over the long weekend to help. The Executive Yuan says a volunteer info spot has been set up at Guangfu train station to direct volunteers and distribute aid. In addition, 1,500 high-pressure water guns will be delivered over the next two days to speed up the cleanup.

For more Taiwan news, tune in:
Mon to Fri at 9:30 pm on Channel 152
Tue to Sat at 1 am on Channel 53

#hualien #guangfu #flood #cleanup #missingperson #disasterrelief

加里洞橋附近尋獲罹難者確認身分"農場員工蔡姓老翁"

2025-09-29

國軍特戰官兵投入花蓮光復災區搜救工作，週一上午在加里洞橋附近找到一具大體，累計18人死亡，相驗後確認是在農場工作的六旬蔡姓老翁，女兒感謝大家相助，總算找到父親大體。

先前找到17位死者，也在這天舉行頭七法會。花蓮災情慘重，除了18人不幸罹難，還有6人仍然失蹤，大型機具也持續開挖可能失蹤地。而清理家園與找人同樣重要，教師節三天連假，不少志工從全台各地湧入，政院表示，在車站出口設有志工分配站，發放物資，高壓水槍這兩天也將到貨1500台。

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Police escort woman to hospital after venomous snake bite

After a 46-year-old woman was bit by a venomous pit viper in Miaoli, her friend rushed her to the hospital. On the way, they spotted a police car on patrol and called for help, as the woman was already losing consciousness. The police car cleared the way with sirens blazing, cutting the 10-minute drive to only five minutes. Thankfully, they arrived at the hospital in time for the woman to make a full recovery.

Waiting at a red light while out on patrol, this police car noticed a vehicle coming from the opposite direction turn left and stop on the side of the road.

The police approached the car thinking it might be an emergency, and the driver quickly called for help.

The police immediately turned on their sirens and led the car to the hospital as quickly as possible.

The driver, seeing her friend losing consciousness, was extremely frightened. Thankfully, the medical staff took over and rushed the woman to the emergency room for treatment.

Hsu Wen-ming
Police station deputy chief
While patrolling along Provincial Highway 72 by Keshu Bridge, police were stopped by a driver. She woman said that her friend, surnamed Hsiao蕭, had been bitten by a venomous brown-spotted pit viper and asked the police to escort them to the hospital. The police saw that Hsiao’s left hand was swollen, and she was losing consciousness. Recognizing the urgency, the police immediately turned on the car’s sirens and lights to clear the way.

The brown-spotted pit viper is one of Taiwan’s six deadly snakes. Hsiao was bitten in the mountainous areas of Miaoli’s TongluoTownship, and her condition worsened quickly while on the way to the hospital. Thanks to the police escort, a trip that should have taken 10 minutes took only five, and Hsiao arrived at the hospital with enough time for treatment.

For more Taiwan news, tune in:
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Chiayi dessert shop makes douhua that looks like ashtray

Soy milk with tofu pudding, or douhua, is one of Chiayi’s famous desserts. Recently, a shop in Chiayi launched a new kind of tofu pudding that looks just like an ashtray. It looks so realistic that customers questioned whether its edible and even reported it to the Department of Health, which came to check it out.

After ordering tofu pudding, this customer was shocked when a full ashtray was brought to her table.

-Can you really eat this?
-You can eat the whole thing.

The customer hesitantly took a bite, and found it really was tofu pudding, also called douhua.

Customer
The first time I got it, I was kind of shocked, because it’s so realistic. My first thought was, is she serious? It’s a little sweet and spicy. Smoking may be unhealthy, but douhua is healthy!

A creative young entrepreneur in Chiayi thought of this ashtray douhua, which uses black sesame, sugar, pepper, and while chocolate biscuits to create the appearance of an ashtray. It looks so realistic that the Department of Health even came to check it out.

Mia
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Yesterday, an inspector from the Department of Health came in and said we may have breached the Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act. It turns out that our douhua looks so realistic that someone reported it, suspecting that it might be illegal.

Customer
It doesn’t look like food that you would order.

The restaurant also offers a salmon roe douhua. But these small pink balls are not salmon roe at all-they’re tapioca pearls. Even the syrup on the side is disguised as soy sauce, giving this sweet dessert a savory appearance.

Customer
I didn’t think it would have this flavor at all. At first, I thought it would be savory, but these tapioca pearls... They really look like salmon roe.

Mia
Entrepreneur
I saw a salmon roe rice bowl and suddenly thought, hey, this could be combined with douhua. Then trying to match the shape of the roe, I found these pink tapioca pearls.

In the age of social media, the camera always eats first. Food not only needs to be delicious, but also visually captivating to get the internet’s attention.

#douhua #tofupudding #soymilk #soybeanpudding #Chiayi #dessert #ashtray #salmonroe #sweet #savory #food #art

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National Day fireworks display to be held in Nantou for the first time

Nantou has never hosted Taiwan’s National Day celebrations. But that is about to change. This year 32,393 fireworks will light up the night sky in the county, in a show that will last 40 minutes. Nantou also will be holding its annual Nantou Global Tea Expo, so it’s the perfect opportunity to check out the teas during the day and watch the pyrotechnics at night. Meanwhile, Taichung will be hosting the National Day performance.

A vast array of colorful fireworks will soon light up Nantou’s skies for National Day on Oct. 10. The show will last 40 minutes and feature more than 30,000 fireworks, sure to leave nobody indifferent.

Hsu Shu-hua
Nantou commissioner
This is the first time since Nantou County was established that we have hosted celebrations at the national level. The National Day fireworks display will flourish in Nantou City. The Maoluo River is an extremely beautiful place and it is where we have held the Nantou Lantern Festival for many years. Many friends in Central Taiwan are quite familiar with this location.

The National Day fireworks display will happen near the Maoluo River and the lover’s bridge, creating a stunning display against the local scenery. Nantou and Taichung have joined forces to invite people from Taiwan and abroad to join the fun.

Hsu Shu-hua
Nantou commissioner
We are co-hosting a press conference with the Taichung City Government. First, the National Day performance on Oct. 9 will be in Taichung, and the National Day fireworks display on Oct. 10 will be in Nantou. We hope that by working together, we can expand our tourist numbers, especially since Nantou hosts the Nantou Global Tea Expo around this time every year.

Visitors can check out the tea expo during the day and watch the fireworks display at night, with more than 1 million visitors expected. Traffic controls will start at noon on National Day, with six shuttle buses routes to keep people moving.

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Employee at famous egg yolk pastry store reveals unsanitary kitchen conditions

Alas, fame isn’t always a hallmark of quality. An employee at a well-known pastry store in Taichung’s North District recently called out the insanitary conditions in their kitchen, online. They posted several photos to back up the claims. After the shock news went viral, the pastry shop owner denied all accusations and insisted that the whistleblower fabricated the claims out of bitterness with the terms of employment. It turned out that the claims were not unfounded, upon an inspection by city authorities.

It’s almost Mid-Autumn Festival. A long line is a common sight at this famed egg yolk pastry shop in Taichung’s North District. But an employee has come out to urge shoppers against their products, saying that the store’s facilities are unsanitary.

Whistleblower (voice altered)
Works at pastry shop
They use the type of plywood sheet used as building material. The dough touches the plywood directly, and we only clean the plywood board every half a year or so. Usually we just scrape off excess oil from the plywood, and even then the oil being scraped off has a sort of rancid smell to it.

The whistleblower also reveals that there’s mold inside the kitchen, and that ingredients are placed in empty, rusted cans and dirty plywood sheets.

Whistleblower (voice altered)
Works at pastry shop
We did buy new wooden sheets for Mid-Autumn Festival. But as you can see in the pictures, there are still traces of paint on them.

Mr. Huang
Pastry shop owner
We leave the cans on the countertop once they’re emptied, because we only ask the recyclers to come in and remove them after there’s a certain volume. So it’s inevitable that some of them may begin to rust. As for the walls where we hang utensils, because we’re always using the kitchen, so it’s inevitable that there are ingredient splatters on the walls. But we clean the area every day, and if you take pictures before cleaning and claim that the marks are mold, that’s just untrue.

The pastry shop owner denies the accusations. He added that even the employee in question has placed an order for the pastries. He says that the employee in question could have been attempting to seek revenge due to their dissatisfaction with the terms of employment.

Mr. Huang
Pastry shop owner
We’re now nearing holiday season. We hope that the person in question would sort out the issue with those involved, and refrain from doing harm to our company out of personal issues.

The Taichung Food and Drug Safety Office has since conducted an inspection and discovered that the pastry shop did not follow best practices for sanitation in the food industry. It has issued the shop with a warning that they could be fined if improvements weren’t made on a second inspection.

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As Hualien continues to recover from devastating floods, stories of quiet heroism are emerging from across Taiwan. Ordinary people are stepping up in extraordinary ways. There’s a tow truck driver clearing roads at night, a coffee shop owner who closed his business to cook thousands of meals and many other unsung heroes.

The crane arm is raised and lowered onto a car caked in mud that can no longer move.

It’s hoisted onto the truck, all by one skilful operator from Jiji, Nantou, dubbed “Tow Truck Superman.”

Tow Truck Superman
Helping with cleanup
In the Jiji Earthquake, lots of people came to help. The TV said they needed tow trucks, so I cleared my schedule and came. I moved about 10 cars these three days. There’s lots of machinery and volunteers, which makes it hard to get in during the day. So I work at night. We first target more urgent cases where the cars are blocking the cleanup or the road. If it’s not in the way, I tell the owners I’ll get back to them later.

Having received much help in the 1999 Jiji Earthquake, he now wants to help out in Hualien, even at the cost of losing job assignments. The situation in Guangfu is rough, and he’s already had to deal with a flat tire.

Tow Truck Superman
Helping with cleanup
There’s a lot of stuff on the road. I must have run over something and ruptured the tire. Luckily, a kind soul gave me a spare tire. So I didn’t have to patch it up. It was just the right size.

Another person who set aside their work to help in the disaster area is the owner of a coffee shop in Kaohsiung. He took the earliest train to Hualien and formed a rescue team with customers.

Lin Yan-yu
Coffee shop boss
The flooding reached above the first floor of many homes in the disaster area, and the sediment in some places is 1.5m deep. We’re all Taiwanese. We’re all one family. We should all use some of our time, energy and strength to help out.

The coffee shop boss completed his studies in the East Coast and started a business in Kaohsiung after graduating. Seeing the devastation in Hualien, he put on his rain boots to clear mud from people’s homes. He also used his catering skills to help a team of 300 people prepare more than 10,000 lunch boxes.

Lin Yan-yu
Coffee shop boss
You can always earn money later. But there’s nothing you can do but spend time to improve the situation. The mud is beginning to harden, so it’s critical that young people and people in general come help out at the disaster site.

Though his coffee shop typically fills with crowds during long weekends, Lin says disaster relief is more important than potentially earning NT$80,000. He hopes that by doing his little bit, he can help people rebuild their homes soon.

For more Taiwan news, tune in:
Mon to Fri at 9:30 pm on Channel 152
Tue to Sat at 1 am on Channel 53

#hualien #guangfu #flooding #disaster #volunteer #helping

2025-09-29