A massive base in the southern part of the South China Sea has made China the country with the fastest response time to emergencies in the region, according to a study by Chinese scientists.
“China’s accessibility [to a scene] for search and rescue operations has significantly improved after the incorporation of the Yongshu Reef port,” a team of scientists led by Su Fenzhen, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, wrote in a peer-reviewed academic paper published this month.
Yongshu is the Chinese name for Fiery Cross Reef, which is part of the Spratly Islands claimed by multiple countries and known as the Nansha Islands in China.
“The average minimum accessible time has dropped significantly to 15.54 hours, with an area coverage rate now exceeding 99 per cent,” Su and his colleagues said.
Previously, the average time it took to reach the Spratlys from Chinese ports was over 33 hours, according to the researchers’ calculations. This made China an underdog among other countries in the region.
Malaysia had the shortest average accessible time of just 16.26 hours. Brunei, the Philippines and Vietnam also enjoyed much faster response times than China, “with average accessible times in the waters all less than 19 hours”, the team wrote.
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