By Bae Ji-sook
Staff Reporter
Pedestrians struggling on the icy roads Wednesday had to look out for one other potential hazard ― icicles falling from buildings.
As the weather warmed during the morning, icicles that formed overnight began to melt and fall, threatening passersby.
A janitor of a 12-story office building in central Seoul roped off the perimeter of the building in the morning and asked pedestrians to walk around it as huge icicles fell from the top. "If one were to hit a person's head, it could seriously hurt him or her. I have banned cars from parking at the back of the building for the same reason," he said.
"I was almost hit by one," said a pedestrian who was walking by another tall building in Seoul. "Icicles are nice to look at but quite scary in that way," she added.
Meanwhile, the March snow has taken people nationwide by surprise. While citizens in the relatively warm southern cities of Busan and Changwon enjoyed the rare snowfall, airports and ports had to delay their departure schedules and road traffic was heavily jammed.
In the mountainous area of Daegwallyeong in Gangwon Province, about 108 centimeters of snow has piled up and ice has yet to begin melting. Seoul and other urban areas saw more than 10 centimeters of snow, a rare scene for March.
The Korea Meteorological Administration said cold atmospheric pressure moving from the northwest clashed with the rather warm atmosphere on the Korean peninsula, resulting in the snow.
"There are chances of another significant snowfall this spring because the higher the temperature goes, the more moisture is in the air, which could easily turn into snow or rain when it meets the cold atmospheric pressure," a weather agency spokesman said.
bjs@koreatimes.co.kr
