One Dead and Three Missing Due to Landslides
Emergency Evacuation Order Issued in Hapcheon-eup Due to Flooding
An unprecedented situation occurred in Sancheong-gun, Gyeongnam, where an evacuation advisory was issued for all residents across the entire region. In Hapcheon-eup, an emergency evacuation order was also issued due to flooding.
According to Yonhap News on the 19th, nearly 300mm of torrential rain fell in Sancheong-gun, Gyeongnam, resulting in four people dead or missing and prompting the first-ever evacuation order for all residents in the county.
On the 19th, some houses in Buri Village, Sancheong-eup, Sancheong-gun, Gyeongnam, were damaged due to heavy rain and landslides. Photo by Yonhap News
According to Gyeongnam Province and the Korea Meteorological Administration, Sancheong-gun sent an emergency disaster text message at around 1:50 p.m. stating, "All residents must evacuate to a safe area immediately," as heavy rain poured down.
This is the first time in history that a single local government has recommended evacuation for its entire jurisdiction, not just specific towns or villages, due to extreme rainfall.
On this day alone (from midnight to 2 p.m.), Sancheong received around 300mm of heavy rain, with 329.5mm in Jirisan and 274.5mm in Samjang-myeon.
In particular, Sicheon-myeon, which has a high risk of landslides due to a large fire in March, recorded 272mm of rainfall.
The cumulative rainfall from the 17th to this day reached 742.5mm in Sicheon-myeon and 720.5mm in Samjang-myeon.
With the ground already saturated from continuous rain since the 17th, the downpour on this day turned many villages in Sancheong-gun, home to about 33,000 people, into scenes of devastation resembling a bombing.
In Sancheong-eup, soil and trees tangled in muddy water swept into residential areas, and some homes were observed to be damaged and collapsed in various places.
In particular, in Buri, Sancheong-eup, a landslide buried two houses, leaving three people missing. In the nearby Naeri Village, a landslide occurred, killing a man in his 40s who was inside his house at the time.
As villages across Sancheong experienced flooding and landslides due to the extreme rainfall, fire authorities issued Level 1 response at 10:20 a.m., raised it to Level 2 within an hour, and from 1 p.m. invoked the National Fire Mobilization Order to begin recovery efforts.
With the National Fire Mobilization Order in effect, firefighting personnel and equipment from other cities and provinces outside Gyeongnam can also be deployed for support.
In Hapcheon, adjacent to Sancheong, flood and rain damage occurred in Hapcheon-eup as well as Yongju-myeon and Gahoe-myeon. In Yongju-myeon, a house was buried by a landslide.
At around 11:50 a.m., Hapcheon-gun issued an evacuation order to residents of Hapcheon-eup after the entire downtown area was flooded.
From the 17th until 2 p.m. on this day, the cumulative rainfall in Hapcheon-eup reached 491.1mm, with 256.5mm falling in a single day.
In Gyeongnam, it was forecast that by 6 p.m., an additional 50 to 80mm of rain per hour would fall, mainly in the inland areas.
The provincial government provisionally tallied damage to 310 public and private facilities, including roads, houses, and vehicles, across Gyeongnam due to landslides and flooding. The scale of the damage is expected to increase as time goes on.
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