Jeonnam Fire Department 'Responsible for Residents' Safety' All-Out Effort to Create a Safe Lunar New Year Holiday

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Yoon Jamin] The Jeonnam Fire Headquarters (Chief Kim Joil) is making every effort to ensure the safety of residents during the nation’s major holiday, the Lunar New Year holiday.

Jeonnam Fire announced on the 5th that it will implement fire prevention measures during the Lunar New Year holiday to reduce fire risks and minimize casualties.

In the past three years, a total of 118 fires occurred in Jeonnam during the Lunar New Year holiday period.

These fires resulted in a total of 7 casualties (5 deaths and 2 injuries) and property damage amounting to approximately 490 million won.

The causes of fires were mostly due to carelessness at 66.9% (79 cases), followed by electrical causes at 18% (22 cases), mechanical causes at 4.2% (5 cases), and other causes such as arson and chemical factors accounting for 12 cases or 10.1%.

Accordingly, Jeonnam Fire aims to ensure a happy Lunar New Year holiday free from fire worries by focusing on four key themes: ▲fire safety inspections of multi-use facilities ▲fire safety management of fire-vulnerable targets ▲creating a fire-safe environment in daily life ▲intensive fire prevention publicity.

First, they plan to conduct unannounced visits before the holiday to multi-use facilities such as large marts and lodging facilities to check the maintenance status of evacuation and fire prevention facilities, and any deficiencies will be corrected before the Lunar New Year holiday.

Traditional markets will carry out joint fire safety inspections with related organizations, and to encourage voluntary safety checks led by store and facility managers, “Safe Day” will be operated every Wednesday.

For facilities housing vulnerable evacuees such as nursing hospitals, large construction sites, and logistics warehouses, fire station safety consulting will be conducted based on the results of voluntary inspections by related personnel.

For residential vulnerable facilities such as residential vinyl greenhouses, fire officials will conduct guidance visits and provide education on the safe use of residential fire equipment, heating appliances, and wood boilers.

Additionally, during the holiday period, fire prevention publicity will be promoted using electronic billboards at multi-use facilities, along with a campaign to gift residential fire safety equipment to hometown houses to reduce casualties from residential fires.

Fire Chief Kim Joil said, “Since more than 60% of fires are caused by carelessness and most fire deaths occur in homes, we ask for the active participation of residents in fire prevention.”