Seoul, South Korea
CNN
—
ln a cavernous Seoul gymnasium Tuesday, grieving households inspected neat rows of belongings left behind on the scene of the lethal road crush in Itaewon.
Shoes, baggage, glasses, notebooks, wallets, cardholders and colourful hats have been laid out on makeshift tables and train mats alongside the polished ground – ready to be claimed by the subsequent of kin of 156 victims killed in Saturday evening’s crowd surge.
“Found it. I think this is the one,” stated one girl, as she acknowledged a black coat, hugging it as she cried.
The middle-aged girl, who had arrived along with her husband, collapsed to the ground in tears after discovering a lacking pair of knee-high boots. It was amongst rows of black boots, stilettos and sneakers. In many circumstances, there was only one shoe.
Another youthful girl, sporting a forged on her left arm, walked into the gymnasium to seek out her lost shoe. This girl, who didn’t need to be named, stated she was in entrance of a bar within the alley when the crush occurred.
Stuck within the crowd, she stated she handed out from asphyxiation “to the point I thought I was dead, but a foreigner shouted at me to wake up.” Her arm was badly bruised in the course of the incident, and after she got here to, the girl stated she simply held on till the gang eased and he or she may very well be rescued.
Family members walked into the gymnasium, one after the other and in small teams, escorted by officers who hurriedly placed on white gloves and confirmed them to the tables, so they may examine and declare the fastidiously organized possessions.
South Korea is in deep mourning for the 156 folks killed, together with 26 foreigners, within the crowd crush on Saturday evening when as many as 100,000 folks crammed into the slender streets of Itaewon to rejoice Halloween.
Officials anticipated massive numbers as a result of recognition of the world for Halloween events in pre-Covid years, however police have admitted they have been unprepared for this 12 months’s crowd.
Speaking to the media on Tuesday, Yoon Hee-keun, head of National Police Agency, bowed deeply as he started a press convention, admitting for the primary time failings on the behalf of the police within the capital that evening.
Yoon stated officers did not adequately reply to the emergency calls that flooded into the police name heart earlier than the catastrophe.
“The calls were about emergencies telling the danger and urgency of the situation that large crowds had gathered before the accident occurred,” Yoon stated. “However, we think the police response to the 112 (emergency telephone number) calls was inadequate.”
On Monday, Oh Seung-jin, director of the company’s violent crime investigation division, stated about 137 personnel had been deployed to Itaewon that evening, in comparison with about 30 to 90 personnel in earlier years earlier than the pandemic.
“For this time’s Halloween festival, because it was expected that many people would gather in Itaewon, I understand that it was prepared by putting in more police force than other years,” stated Oh.
However, police on the scene have been tasked with cracking down on criminal activity such as drug taking and sexual abuse within the space “rather than on site control,” Oh stated.
On Tuesday, South Korea’s Prime Minister Han Duck-soo stated a “lack of institutional knowledge and consideration for crowd management” was partly in charge for the gang crush.
“One of the reasons was a lack of deep institutional knowledge and consideration for crowd management. However, the police are investigating,” Han stated.
“Even if more police were put in (to the site), there seems to have been a limit in the situation as we don’t have a crowd management system, but we’ll need to wait for the police investigation to find out the cause,” he added.
CNN reporter returns to Itaewon’s slender alley someday after the Halloween catastrophe. See what’s it like
At a Tuesday Cabinet assembly, President Yoon Suk Yeol urged the necessity to set up techniques to forestall comparable tragedies.
“In addition to side streets where this time’s large disaster happened, (we) need to establish safety measures at stadiums, performance venues and etc. where crowds gather,” he stated, including that the federal government will maintain a nationwide security system inspection assembly with related ministers and specialists quickly.
