Jecheon fire shows disregard of safety measures
A fire that killed 29 people and injured 29 others in a city in North Chungcheong Province, Thursday, is certainly a disaster that could have been avoided with proper precautions. In this sense, this tragic fire has many reasons to be called a manmade disaster.
A swift response is vital to firefighting. However, firefighters failed to take quick action. First, they had difficulty in getting to the eight-story commercial building, through which the blaze was raging rapidly, in Jecheon, 170 kilometers south of Seoul, due to illegally parked cars around the site.
The fire department sent 60 firefighters to the scene, along with 48 fire engines and two helicopters, seven minutes after they received a report at 3:53 p.m. The first thing they should have done was shatter the large glass wall that surrounded the second floor structure, where a public bath for women was located.
But their late action led to a failure in rescuing 20 women who were dying there. The firefighters wasted time just spraying water without breaking the glass.
Another problem was that firefighters had difficulty in using their equipment to rescue people on higher floors. They should have mobilized a hook-and-ladder truck. But they couldn't do so, apparently because it did not work properly. A private operator of cargo ladder trucks rushed to the scene and rescued three people on the eighth floor. Belatedly, the firefighters fixed the problem and rescued one person on the same floor.
More serious was a lack of fire precautions and insufficient emergency exits in the building. There was a parking lot on the first floor, a public bath on the second and third floors, a fitness center on the fourth, fifth and six floors, and restaurants on the seventh and eighth floors. But the structure reportedly had no working fire alarms or sprinklers. Fire authorities must have neglected a regular mandatory check on such devices in the building.
The worst problem is that the structure was nothing but a fire trap as it was full of flammable finishing materials. The fire started from the ceiling of the ground floor parking lot. It spread quickly upwards along the outside walls of the building, which contained cladding materials made of a cement and foam sandwich. Undoubtedly, this foam sandwich _ widely used material for insulation ― helped engulf the whole structure in flames and smoke in just seven minutes.
The Jecheon case is the worst fire since 2008, when a blaze claimed the lives of 40 workers at a refrigerated warehouse in Icheon, east of Seoul. The repetition of such disasters only demonstrates that authorities have made little effort to keep people safe. Now it is high time to establish an airtight firefighting and disaster prevention system before it is too late.
A fire that killed 29 people and injured 29 others in a city in North Chungcheong Province, Thursday, is certainly a disaster that could have been avoided with proper precautions. In this sense, this tragic fire has many reasons to be called a manmade disaster.
A swift response is vital to firefighting. However, firefighters failed to take quick action. First, they had difficulty in getting to the eight-story commercial building, through which the blaze was raging rapidly, in Jecheon, 170 kilometers south of Seoul, due to illegally parked cars around the site.
The fire department sent 60 firefighters to the scene, along with 48 fire engines and two helicopters, seven minutes after they received a report at 3:53 p.m. The first thing they should have done was shatter the large glass wall that surrounded the second floor structure, where a public bath for women was located.
But their late action led to a failure in rescuing 20 women who were dying there. The firefighters wasted time just spraying water without breaking the glass.
Another problem was that firefighters had difficulty in using their equipment to rescue people on higher floors. They should have mobilized a hook-and-ladder truck. But they couldn't do so, apparently because it did not work properly. A private operator of cargo ladder trucks rushed to the scene and rescued three people on the eighth floor. Belatedly, the firefighters fixed the problem and rescued one person on the same floor.
More serious was a lack of fire precautions and insufficient emergency exits in the building. There was a parking lot on the first floor, a public bath on the second and third floors, a fitness center on the fourth, fifth and six floors, and restaurants on the seventh and eighth floors. But the structure reportedly had no working fire alarms or sprinklers. Fire authorities must have neglected a regular mandatory check on such devices in the building.
The worst problem is that the structure was nothing but a fire trap as it was full of flammable finishing materials. The fire started from the ceiling of the ground floor parking lot. It spread quickly upwards along the outside walls of the building, which contained cladding materials made of a cement and foam sandwich. Undoubtedly, this foam sandwich _ widely used material for insulation ― helped engulf the whole structure in flames and smoke in just seven minutes.
The Jecheon case is the worst fire since 2008, when a blaze claimed the lives of 40 workers at a refrigerated warehouse in Icheon, east of Seoul. The repetition of such disasters only demonstrates that authorities have made little effort to keep people safe. Now it is high time to establish an airtight firefighting and disaster prevention system before it is too late.
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