[Anchor]
We now turn to the heavy rain damage centered along the southern coast of Gyeongsangnam-do. In Tongyeong, a woman in her 60s was buried and injured in a landslide early on the morning of August 17. However, our reporting reveals that residents received emergency text alerts about the landslide long after the accident had already occurred.
Reporter Kim Minjun brings us this exclusive report.
[Reporter]
At 5:03 a.m. on August 17, a report was filed with the Coast Guard asking to rescue a woman in her 60s who was buried in a landslide on Gonrido Island in Tongyeong, Gyeongsangnam-do.
At the time, torrential rain of 74.9 mm per hour was pounding Tongyeong.
[Son of the Landslide Victim : I told her to come inside quickly because it was raining so hard, but at that exact moment, there was a loud pop and in less than three seconds, we were both swept away together by the mud.]
It was an hour and a half later when the woman in her 60s was rescued by the Coast Guard and her 30-year-old son, who dug through the mud with his bare hands, and transferred to a hospital.
Yet, according to SBS's reporting, the Tongyeong City Hall did not send out landslide evacuation text messages to residents until around 7:00 a.m., about 30 minutes after that.
A belated text message notifying residents of the evacuation and landslide advisory was delivered only after a resident had already been injured by the landslide and fully rescued.
While acknowledging that the text dispatch was delayed, an official from Tongyeong City explained that there were unavoidable circumstances.
[Tongyeong City Hall Official : We simply couldn't have anticipated that it would rain that heavily in the early morning. It was too difficult for us to make a judgment.]
Currently, landslide risk notifications operate such that the Korea Forest Service sends forecast information to local governments every hour, and based on that information, local governments decide whether to issue advisories or send text messages. However, the decision was delayed at the local government level.
Even though the landslide advisory system was expanded from two stages to three stages the year before last to prevent such errors and secure sufficient evacuation time, it proved to be completely useless.
Experts emphasized that under the current advisory system, which is split between the Korea Forest Service and local governments, local governments must establish internal systems that allow for faster decision-making.
(Camera Reporter : Jung Kyeong-moon | Video Editor : Shin Se-eun | Designer : Seo Hyun-jung)
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