SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol declared a period of national mourning on Sunday after a crush of Halloween partygoers killed 151 people in a packed nightlife area in Seoul overnight.
South Korean leaders have pledged to change how the country operates after a series of major accidents and disasters tarnished the image of a nation that rose to wealth from the rubble of a war in a few decades.
Here are details of some of South Korea’s worst disasters and accidents over the last three decades:
April 2020: Thirty-eight people are killed and at least 12 injured in a fire accident at a logistics facility construction site in Icheon near Seoul.
January 2018: Forty-seven people are killed and at least 145 injured in a fire at a hospital in Miryang in the southeastern province of South Gyeongsang.
December 2017: Twenty-nine people are killed and at least 40 injured in a fire at a multi-purpose building in Jecheon in the central province of North Chungcheong.
April 2014: Two hundred ninety-five people are killed and nine missing in the sinking of a ferry vessel on the sea off Jindo in the southwestern province of South Jeolla.
February 2014: Ten people are killed and at least 105 injured when a gymnasium roof collapses after heavy snowfall in Gyeongju in the southeastern province of North Gyeongsang.
January 2008: Forty people are killed and at least 10 injured in a fire at a cold storage facility in Icheon.
October 2005: Eleven people are killed and at least 162 injured in a stampede at a stadium in Sangju, North Gyeongsang Province.
February 2003: One hundred ninety-two people are killed, six missing and at least 151 injured in an arson incident on a subway train car in the southern city of Daegu.
June 1995: Five hundred and two people are killed, six missing and at least 937 injured in a collapse of a department store building in the afternoon in Seoul.
April 1995: One hundred and one people are killed and at least 202 injured in a collapse after a gas explosion at a subway construction site in Daegu.
October 1994: Thirty-two people are killed and at least 17 injured in a collapse during the morning commute on a bridge crossing the Han River in Seoul.
(Compiled by Seoul Newsroom; Editing by William Mallard)
