"Bang," Instantly Swallowed It Up… Transported to Hospital With Full-Body Burns

[Anchor]

This afternoon (August 13), a fire broke out at an asphalt manufacturing plant in Jincheon, North Chungcheong Province, leaving a worker in his 60s with severe burns. Although the explosion was loud enough to raise concerns of a major disaster, the fire authorities' swift response succeeded in extinguishing the fire in its early stages.

Lee Hwan from CJB reports.

[Reporter]

Crimson flames surge and swallow the inside of the plant, while thick black smoke billows into the air.

The fire broke out at an asphalt manufacturing plant in Gwanghyeowon-myeon, Jincheon-gun, at around 1:30 PM today. Police suspect that a spark caused by static electricity occurred while mixing toluene, a flammable substance, into an asphalt concrete container.

[Witness: I heard a loud 'bang' sound, almost like an explosion. I was startled and rushed out of the office. When I came out and looked behind, there was massive smoke along with flames.]

It is reported that three workers were inside the plant at the time of the fire.

As a result of the fire, a man in his 60s working at the plant suffered second-degree burns over his entire body and was transported to the hospital.

When the fire quickly spread to the large amount of flammable substances inside the plant, the fire department issued a Level 1 response about 20 minutes after the fire broke out, mobilizing the jurisdiction fire station's available personnel and equipment to the maximum and concentrating firefighting forces.

[Choi Won-seok / Jincheon Fire Station, North Chungcheong Province: We determined that preventing the fire from spreading to surrounding buildings was our top priority, and the command team and commanders made preventing the spread to adjacent areas the top priority.]

Although firefighting operations faced difficulties because the interior of the plant was structured with sandwich panels and piled with materials, authorities succeeded in bringing the major flames under control in about two hours.

Police and fire authorities plan to investigate the exact cause of the fire and the scale of the damage as soon as the fire is completely extinguished.

(Video by: Kim Geun-hyeok CJB)

Lee Hwan, CJB
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.