The memorial hall for late President Park Chung-hee is destroyed in a fire on Dec. 1, 2016, in his birthplace in Gumi, some 261 kilometers southeast of Seoul. The fire took place at around 3:15 p.m., and is being investigated as arson, at a time when his daughter, incumbent President Park Geun-hye, is facing strong public pressure to step down in order to take responsibility for an influence-peddling scandal involving herself and her confidante. (Yonhap)
This is a really horrible tragedy which appears to have been caused by negligence by the driver:
A fire on a tour bus killed 10 people Thursday night on a highway in Ulsan. Seven others on the bus, which was carrying 22 people including a tour guide and the driver, were injured.
About 10:10 p.m., the bus scraped against a crash barrier several times while changing lanes. It then caught fire.
The passengers could not get out because the crash barrier was blocking the door. Some of them managed to break the window and escape, but 10 people could not escape from the smoke and fire, survivors and witnesses said.
Firefighters extinguished the fire at 11:01 p.m. Only the frame of the bus was left.
The tour guide told police that they couldn’t find the emergency hammer, so the driver used a fire extinguisher to break the windows.
The driver, surnamed Lee, 49, claimed that one of the tires went flat and made the bus lose balance. He added he did not doze off. But police suspect he was speeding, based on traffic camera footage and testimony from some of the passengers that the bus was travelling at high speed before suddenly changing lanes.
Police will request an arrest warrant for the driver for accidental homicide, saying Lee did not drive safely enough. “The driver claims the accident was caused by a flat tire, so we will send the bus to the National Forensic Service for inspection,” Choi Ik-soo, chief of the Ulju Police Station, told journalists at a briefing. [Korea Times]
Sadly one of the USFK servicemembers who helped rescue a family in Songtan from a building fire has passed away from an injury she received during the rescue:
Staff Sgt. Cierra Rogers died May 20, 2016 in Florida from injuries she sustained in April while rescuing a family from a burning building near Osan Air Base, South Korea.
The 731st Air Mobility Squadron at Osan Air Base has honored an airman who died from injuries sustained while helping save a family from a burning building.
Staff Sgt. Cierra Rogers died May 20 shortly after arriving at her follow-on duty station in Florida. She was 26 years old. Rogers, who was credited with being the first airman to arrive at the scene, was hospitalized in the days following the April 29 fire in South Korea’s Songtan district and required surgery. (……..)
“This beauty was in the hospital when everyone was being interviewed,” friend Kris Murray wrote in a tribute post on Facebook. “[Cierra] remained calm and told the mom how to breathe in the smoke, then convinced the mom to throw her three babies out the window to safety where firefighters and a few airman and soldiers waited to catch them. Cierra got very hurt in the process while sliding down some wires and kicking a window in.” [Stars & Stripes]
You can read more at the link, but this article from the Osan AB public affairs office does describe Staff Sergeant Rogers’ action during the fire and how she sustained the injury:
taff Sgt. Cierra Rogers, 731st Air Mobility Squadron administrative assistant, was among the five individuals trapped inside the apartment. When they began to smell smoke and noticed a fire broke out, she reacted quickly to help the mother and her children get out the building.
Rogers explained that after realizing they could not go through the main doors, she kicked through one of the windows leading to the apartment’s patio, which provided the only means of escape from the smoke and growing flames.
“From then I made a decision because you can easily die from choking on smoke,” said Rogers.
Despite the deep laceration she suffered from kicking through the glass, Rogers continued to push forward to get herself and the family closer to safety.
She looked down on the alley below. She attempted to scale down the building using wires near the patio. A few steps down she slid down the wire, falling 15 feet to the ground.
Several service members quickly rushed to her side to provide self aid buddy care until first responders arrived. [Osan PAO]
You can read more at the link, but condolences to her friends and family for their loss.
Firefighters put out a fire on a Korean Air plane on the runway of Haneda Airport in Tokyo on May 27, 2016, in this photo released by Kyodo News. The left wing of the plane bound for Seoul caught fire before takeoff, but all 319 passengers and crew were safely evacuated, according to the Japanese news agency. (Yonhap)
Via a reader tip comes this dramatic rescue story of US servicemembers saving a Nigerian family from a burning building outside of Osan AB:
The scenario, captured in mobile phone footage, is a mother’s nightmare. On the fourth story of a burning building in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, a woman dangles her baby out the window as smoke billows from two floors below. Onlookers scream and wave their hands as the 30-year-old mother holds out the terrified infant — the child’s legs kicking furiously — before dropping her to the crowd. Another child follows, then another, before the woman herself leaps from the window — the only escape route. Remarkably, all survived without injury Saturday, caught safely on blankets in a rescue effort orchestrated by passing U.S. service personnel stationed at nearby Osan Air Base.
U.S. Air Force Master Sgt. Daniel Raimondo told CNN he was walking to dinner Saturday when he saw clouds of smoke and set off in that direction. On assessing the scene, he and a colleague discussed how to help and resolved to get some blankets from a nearby store. They corralled others to help hold the blankets, then tried to persuade the mother to drop her children to safety. First Sgt. Melanie Scott said the woman was understandably reluctant to let go of her children, ages 1, 3 and 4.
“You could tell she was scared. She didn’t want to.” Raimondo said that the “last baby was the most difficult in my eyes, she just wouldn’t let her go for some reason.” He said he repeatedly begged the mother: “Please just throw the baby down!” “I remember her screaming (at) the baby, ‘I love you, I love you. …’ Next thing you know she dropped the baby.” [CNN]
You can read the rest at the link, but quick thinking and great job by everyone involved in this rescue effort.
This is a pretty freak fire that has unfortunately taken the life of a Seoul firefighter:
The Seohae Grand Bridge, a major artery connecting southwestern cities and Seoul, was shut down after three of its cables were damaged in a fire Thursday evening.
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced on Friday that it will suspend use of the bridge through Dec. 24 to replace the cables.
Authorities said one firefighter was killed and two others wounded when they were hit by a snapped cable while battling the blaze.
An official of the ministry said lightning was the cause of the fire.
“Despite the inconvenience, our decision was made for the public’s safety,” the official said at a televised press conference. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
This provided photo shows black smoke billowing from a food-making plant in Dongducheon, Gyeonggi Province, north of Seoul, on Sept. 17, 2015, as the three-story building is engulfed by a fire. No casualties were reported. (Yonhap)
In this photo, exclusively obtained and released on June 12, 2015 by local radio station BBS, black smoke and flames billow from a bridge between the 43rd floors of Koryo Hotel in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang on the previous day. The fire had broken out at the hotel frequented by foreigners, without any information being provided on casualties or property damage, reports said on June 12, 2015. The fire appears to have been extinguished, according to The Associated Press. (Yonhap)
I wonder if the North Koreans intentionally set this fire or not?
The Dora Observatory in Paju, north of Seoul, is enveloped in smoke after fire broke out in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) in North Korea and spread to the South Korean side, Monday. No injuries or damage were reported. / Yonhap
A fire broke out on North Korea’s side of the heavily guarded demilitarized zone (DMZ) on Monday afternoon, South Korean authorities said.
The fire spread through the barbed-wire fence separating the two Koreas at 1:15 p.m., reaching the Dora Observatory in Paju City, Gyeonggi Province.
“The fire started in North Korean territory and spread south,” an official said.
The northern region of Gyeonggi Province recently issued a drought warning.
Seven fire engines and about 50 firemen fought the blaze. [Korea Times]
Here is another preventable deadly safety related accident in South Korea:
Five people, including three children, died and two others were injured in a tent fire at a camping site in Incheon, a port city west of Seoul, early Sunday, police and fire officials said.
The fire broke out around 1:20 a.m. inside a 16 square-meter tent set up at a camping ground close to a beach on Ganghwa Island of Incheon, according to the officials. Those killed included a 37-year-old father, identified only by his last name Lee, and two of his sons, aged 11 and six, they said. Lee’s middle school friend, surnamed Cheon, and his seven-year-old son were also killed inside the same tent. [Yonhap]
