Cars were crammed on the expressways as major Seoul-bound highways and roads were jammed bumper-to-bumper with returning travelers who had visited the eastern mountainous Gangwon Province for skiing and the east coast to see the first sunrise of the new year.
Traffic authorities estimated the Gangwon-Seoul highway driving would take over six hours, considerably more than the usual three hours, Yonhap News reported on Saturday.
Up to 9.5 cm of heavy snow in the eastern province caused many returning travelers to Seoul to spend most of their second day of the New Year holiday stranded on the roads.
The Korea Expressway Corp., the state-run body for managing highways, said the speed in some sections of the roads was as slow as 30 km per hour, bringing traffic to a near standstill.
“Many New Year Holiday travelers to the east coast to see the first sunrise of the year appeared to have decided to return back to Seoul earlier than their original schedule when they heard of the news of the heavy snow,” a KEC official told Yonhap.