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Today (9th), a large fire broke out in the parking tower of an officetel building in Busan, evacuating hundreds of people and injuring more than 30 people.
The fire spread faster because the outer walls of the building were made of flammable materials.
Reporter Hong Seung-yeon covered the story.
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The parking tower building was engulfed in red flames.
Flames spewed out incessantly, and acrid smoke covered the area.
Around 6:30 this morning, a fire broke out in an officetel parking tower in Seomyeon, Busan.
The fire quickly reached the top floor along the outer wall of the parking tower.
As the fire moved to a two-story shopping mall right next door, the second stage of response was issued, in which the nearby fire department was mobilized.
[Nearby Merchant: (Fire) went up over there, but it went up right away.
A piece of aluminum just fell from the sky.] The
fire was put out at around 2:40 pm, after 8 hours, but about 550 residents of the officetel were evacuated.
In the process, 37 people inhaled smoke and 7 people were treated in hospital.
[Officetel residents: The elevator doesn't work, and there's smoke in places like emergency stairs.
I packed my clothes and stuff (it's on the way out.)]
The building that caught fire was built with the so-called 'Dryvit' method using Styrofoam for insulation, which was the same method used in the fire at the Jecheon Sports Center in 2017, in which 29 people died.
Since 2015, it has been banned from being used in new buildings with 6 floors or more, but the building has been in the regulatory blind spot for more than 20 years since it was built.
[Lee Chang-woo/Professor, Department of Fire and Disaster Prevention
, Soongsil Cyber University: Since retroactive application cannot be applied to buildings built in the past, (such buildings) have to exist.]
We are going to have a forensic event.
(Video coverage: Jeong Kyung-moon, video editing: Choi Hye-ran, CG: Jeon Yoo-geun)