Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen has cancelled her election campaign activities for three days after the island's top military officer, Air Force General Shen Yi-ming and seven others died in a helicopter crash landing on Jan. 2, Aljazeera reported.
Kuomintang also announced suspension of campaign activities
This was followed by an announcement from presidential candidate Han Kuo-yu's party, the Kuomintang (KMT), that they would also suspend election activities, for both Jan. 2 and Jan. 3 in the wake of the incident, Taiwanese media DWnews reported.
Chopper crashed shortly after takeoff
Focus Taiwan reported that the UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter carried a total of 13 people and came down in the mountainous Wulai district in New Taipei.
It had been on its way to a military base in Yilan county for a pre-Lunar New Year military inspection in the early morning, before disappearing from radar screens at 8.07am, less than 15 minutes after takeoff.
Initially described as an emergency landing
Initially, the incident had been described by the island's defence ministry to be an emergency landing, CNA reported.
Reports of survivors were also initially unclear.
A local fire fighting unit was highlighted by Taiwanese media DWnews as stating that Shen had been rescued and his injuries were not serious.
However, this was subsequently clarified by the defence ministry to be misinformation.
How did the candidates react?
A Facebook notice put up by Tsai at about 11.06am stated that she had been briefed about the incident and had issued the directions for a search-and-rescue effort to ensure the safety of the personnel in the chopper.
He further called for the avoidance of spreading false news so as to avoid hampering the defence ministry and rescue personnel.
Cause of crash still unclear
Aljazeera further reported that the cause of the crash still remains unclear.
Taiwanese Air Force Commander Hsiung Hou-chi has stated that investigations are being carried out to determine whether the cause of crash was mechanical or environmental.
Ground troops and rescue helicopters have also since been deployed to the crash site.
Black Hawk helicopters were purchased from the U.S.
South China Morning Post reported that the helicopter in question is one of the Black Hawk helicopters that Taiwan purchased from the U.S. in 2010.
One such helicopter was also involved in an earlier crash in 2018 off Orchid Island, in which six people died after pilots ignored warning signals for air turbulence.
Top image from Taiwan Central Disaster Response Center