The last three members of a Taiwan tourist group stranded in quake-hit Sichuan Province were transported to the provincial capital Chengdu safe and sound on Monday.

They arrived in Chengdu at about 5:30 p.m. aboard a military helicopter.

Eleven others of the elderly Taiwan tourists, including five aged around 75, were transported to the city Sunday noon. They were stranded in a tour to Sichuan when the 8-magnitude earthquake jolted the region.

Immediate medical checkups showed none of them suffered serious health problems.

The 14 were trapped in a mountainous area close to the epicenter of Wenchuan County and sought shelter in an adjacent village.

Villagers offered food to them over the past days and they stayed on the tour bus overnight. But they lost contact with their tour agencies.

Two helicopters took off Saturday noon to transport the tourists after Chinese authorities tracked down their location on Friday using satellite positioning technologies. But bad weather forced the pilots to call off the mission.

After Sunday's rescue mission, a helicopter flew to the village twice in the afternoon but the remaining three tourists did not show up at the appointed time.

Considering the critically injured people aboard, the helicopter flew back to Chengdu, said Lin Ping, an official with the Taiwan affairs office of Sichuan.

All the 14 would stay in Chengdu for a couple of days under medical observation before returning to Taiwan, an official with the Taiwan-based tourist association has said.

They were reported as the last group of tourists outside the Chinese mainland stranded in the quake-hit area.

Some 700 other Taiwanese, stranded in Chengdu and Chongqing Municipality since the quake, returned to the island Friday and Saturday on four chartered flights.

(Xinhua News Agency May 19, 2008)