Absurd 'Landslide' Debate Erupts... "Then Is This a Field?"

[Anchor]

In Geoje, South Gyeongsang Province, where a landslide claimed one life, a debate has broken out over whether the disaster actually qualifies as a landslide. While the Geoje City Hall department in charge of landslides argued that it was not a landslide, the department responsible for architecture countered that it was. Residents are bewildered by this apparent attempt to shift responsibility, especially after a human life was lost.

Reporter Cho Min-ki has the details.

[Reporter]

This is the apartment complex in Okpo-dong, Geoje, where a resident on the first floor died due to a landslide.

The mountain behind the apartment, which collapsed and engulfed the lower floors, still reveals its steep slope.

Retaining walls and fences to prevent falling rocks were installed, but they proved useless. The narrow distance between the retaining wall and the building—so tight that a person can barely squeeze through—only worsened the scale of the damage.

[Kim Jung-su / Affected Apartment Resident (Aug 17): Trees were crashing down and pushing forward, so I was really shocked.]

However, the Geoje City Hall department responsible for landslides claimed that this accident was not a landslide.

They argued that because the section where the soil and debris washed down is located within the apartment's plot rather than forested land on the map, it cannot be classified as a landslide.

[Official A, Geoje City Hall: All the causal actions and such are unrelated to a landslide right now, and from our perspective, while it is a mountain, we are stating that this is the collapse of a housing retaining wall that occurred within the building site.]

They instead told reporters to inquire with the department in charge of apartment architecture within the same city hall, but that department stated they find the claim incomprehensible.

They maintain that this incident should be viewed as a natural disaster, specifically a landslide.

[Official B, Geoje City Hall: From my perspective, obviously the adjacent forested land collapsed together as well. Cutting off just the building site portion and saying only that collapsed makes no sense at all.]

The affected residents expressed utter absurdity at the debate itself.

[Park Jong-gi / Affected Apartment Resident: It's a mountain. What else could it be if not a mountain? Is this a field or something?]

Even in the landslide hazard map issued by the Korea Forest Service, the area surrounding the accident site is classified as Grade 1, which has the highest probability of landslides.

Regarding this untimely landslide debate, an official from the Korea Forest Service told SBS in response to an inquiry, "Administratively speaking, it may be seen as not being a landslide, but it could be difficult for residents and the public to understand."

(Camera Reporter: Jung Kyung-mun, Yoon Hyung, Kang Si-woo | Video Editor: Lee Sang-min | Designer: Kang Yoon-jung)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.