Source: CARTURE Auto Culture
https://www.carture.com.tw/opinion/article/26782-影音／亞洲車神陳和皇領軍！台灣消防隊員參與2023亞洲越野拉力賽吸引目光！

(Source: CARTURE Auto Culture, published on 2023/08/14)

 

Held annually in August in the Indochina Peninsula, the Asia Cross Country Rally (AXCR) is one of Asia’s largest rally events. Returning after the pandemic, this year’s race featured over 60 off-road vehicles from 11 countries, including motorcycles and cars. Along with support and media vehicles, a team of over 500 people set off on the evening of August 13 from the Pattaya pedestrian zone, heading toward Laos to tackle a challenging and variable off-road course.

Three firefighters from Taiwan—Lin Zhengwei and Li Yating (Taichung City Fire Department) and Xie Menghong (Kaohsiung City Fire Department)—will represent Taiwan’s rescue personnel by driving Ustini iTAIWAN Rally Team race cars, decorated with the Fire Phoenix Team emblem and bearing “Taiwan” license plates, as they race across Thailand and Laos.

The participation of these firefighters in the Asia Cross Country Rally aims to enhance Taiwan’s rescue teams’ ability to overcome complex and challenging terrains, enabling heroes to reach disaster sites smoothly and save more trapped victims.

 

This training originates from the Society of Safe Driving’s commitment to improving the driving skills, safe driving methods, and equipment usage awareness for personnel in special units such as firefighting, rescue, and military. The Society collaborates with the Ministry of the Interior’s Fire Department to conduct a two-stage safety driving training program for firefighting and rescue personnel.

The first phase, "Training through Competition," has the Society of Safe Driving appoint Chairman Chen Hehuang—Taiwan’s most experienced cross-country rally driver—to lead trainees to participate in the 2023 Asia Cross Country Rally across Thailand and Laos. Over six days and nearly 2,000 kilometers from Pattaya, Thailand to Pakse, Laos—one of Asia’s toughest terrains—trainees gain Chen’s lifetime safe-driving expertise and improve off-road driving skills. They will become top instructors for the second phase, the "Comprehensive Firefighter Training." According to reports, continuous heavy rains in Laos caused flooding and muddy, unpaved mountain and rural roads, increasing the race’s difficulty but providing excellent training opportunities for the Ustini iTAIWAN Rally Team’s “training through competition” approach.