Son Rescues Mother from Mudslide, but Warning Text Arrives Too Late

[Anchor]

We continue with our coverage of the severe torrential rain damage along the southern coast of Gyeongsangnam-do. In Tongyeong, a woman in her 60s was buried and injured in a landslide early in the morning on the 17th. However, our reporting has revealed that local residents received disaster text messages warning of the landslide long after the accident had already occurred.

Reporter Kim Minjun brings us this exclusive report.

[Reporter]

At 5:03 a.m. on the 17th, the Coast Guard received an emergency report to rescue a woman in her 60s who was buried in a landslide on Gonrido Island, 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 split second, there was a loud bang, and within three seconds, we were both swept away together by the mud.]

It was an hour and a half later when her 30-year-old son, who scooped out the mud with his bare hands, and the Coast Guard rescued the woman in her 60s and transported her to a hospital.

However, SBS reporting confirmed that it was only at 7:00 a.m., about 30 minutes after the rescue, that the Tongyeong City Hall sent out landslide evacuation text messages to residents.

The tardy text messages informing residents of the evacuation and landslide advisory were delivered only after a resident had already been injured and fully rescued from the landslide.

While acknowledging that the text message dispatch was delayed, an official from Tongyeong City Hall 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 hours. It was so difficult for us to make a judgment.]

Currently, landslide risk alerts operate by having the Korea Forest Service send predictive information to local governments every hour, upon which 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 divided between the Korea Forest Service and local governments, local authorities must establish internal systems that allow for more prompt decision-making.

(Video reporting: Jung Kyeong-moon, Video editing: Shin Se-eun, Design: Seo Hyun-joong)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.