Taiwan

One missing mainland tourist confirmed dead

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-10-29 08:15

TAIPEI -?Gong Yan, a Chinese mainland tourist missing since October 21 after Typhoon Megi triggered a landslide on Taiwan's eastern coastal Suao-Hualien Highway, was confirmed dead Thursday, according to the local prosecutor's office.

A rescue team found her remains in the sea near Ilan County Monday, and DNA identification confirmed her identity, the office said.

Twenty-one members of a tour group -- 19 mainland tourists from south China's Guangdong province, a local guide and a local driver -- have also been out of contact since October 21, after their bus was hit by the landslide.

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Gong was one of the 19 mainland tourists on the bus. No one else from the group has been confirmed dead so far.

After more than seven days of search operations, tour group leader Tian Yuan, from Beijing, who was on another bus hit by the landslide, also remains missing. Tsai Chih-ming, a Taiwanese driver on the same bus as Tian, was confirmed dead Tuesday.

The deadly landslides last week on the highway have left three dead and 23 others missing, including the 19 mainland tourists.

A local rescue team continued its search for the missing victims Thursday.

Taiwan authorities dispatched 215 people from the local fire brigade, the military force, and highway management agency to search the areas around the collapsed sections of the highway, and sent another 125 people to search the waters off the eastern coast. In addition, two helicopters were sent to assist in the search.

Zhang Shenglin, deputy secretary-general of the mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), visited the landslide site in Ilan Thursday and visited two mainland tourists injured in the accident and being treated in a hospital in Taipei.