Police questioned company officials yesterday to determine the cause of a devastating fire at a cold storage warehouse that left 40 people dead and 10 injured, some with severe burns.
The fire and accompanying explosions ripped through the nearly completed warehouse in Icheon, about 80km south of the capital, on Monday, spewing toxic fumes over the surrounding industrial zone.
The badly charred bodies were found hours later in the basement, where fire official Kim Jung-geun said some of the workers had been injecting urethane foam into the walls of the facility.
PHOTO: AFP
Ten workers were hospitalized for burns and smoke inhalation. Another seven people were able to escape from the building.
Police were questioning officials from more than 10 subcontractors for Korea 2000, a logistics company that owns the warehouse, to determine the cause of the fire, said Jung Ha-gil, a detective working on the case.
He did not give further details, citing the ongoing investigation.
South Korean president-elect Lee Myung-bak visited the area yesterday and Foreign Minister Song Min-soon planned to convey condolences to his Chinese counterpart.
A spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Seoul said 12 ethnic Koreans with Chinese nationality died and another was hospitalized for burns.
The spokesman spoke on condition of anonymity, citing policy.
More than 300,000 ethnic Koreans from China live in South Korea, according to the South Korean Justice Ministry. Like other foreign migrants, they often end up working in factories or doing difficult and low-paying work that affluent South Koreans have increasingly shunned.
The sprawling 22,338m2 facility was intended to refrigerate items such as meat and fruit, said Jung Jin-ho, a Korea 2000 official.
He said that his company met representatives of the victims and would offer compensation if requested. He confirmed company officials were being questioned.
The Icheon city government set up a special place for people to mourn the deceased, a common practice in South Korea before an official funeral service is held. Chinese relatives of the dead and injured will receive expedited visas, the Foreign Ministry said.
Home Affairs Minister Park Myung-jae blamed a lack of safety measures for the deaths, the Icheon city government said.
Progress in identifying the dead, which had been hampered by the condition of the bodies, was progressing, Kim said. So far 10 victims have been positively identified, according to a task force at Icheon city.
Icheon city official Won Jong-oh said DNA analysis was still needed for identification of the rest of the bodies.
Through the noise of rushing papers and whirring belts at a print factory in Kyoto, two creators watch their photo essay come to life in broadsheet form — part of an effort to win new audiences in the age of artificial intelligence (AI). Despite the decline of the publishing industry, self-publication and handmade “zine” magazines are growing in popularity in Japan, reflecting the nation’s enduring love of paper in the digital era. While speaking to Agence France-Presse at the plant, his hands black with ink, one of the creators, Kazuma Obara, said: “I think [paper] is a medium that engages all five
‘CROSSING THE LINE’: China’s embassy in Seoul criticized US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson, asking if his ‘hostile’ remarks were authorized by Washington South Korea and the US are in talks over recent public remarks by the commander of US Forces Korea, Seoul’s presidential office said yesterday, after the comments drew sharp criticism from China. In a recent podcast interview, US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson described South Korea as “the dagger in the heart of Asia” from China’s east coast, prompting the Chinese embassy in Seoul to say that he had “truly crossed the line.” The interview came amid growing speculation that Washington might seek to expand the role of US Forces Korea in countering the growing regional influence of China, a key
Australian researchers have trained lab-grown brain cells on a silicon computer chip to play the 1990s shooter game Doom and said they are just scratching the surface of what the neurons could be capable of doing. It is the science-fiction work of biotech boffins at Cortical Labs, who researched and developed the technology that harnesses the workings of the brain’s networking system. Each so-called “biological computer” contains about 200,000 living human brain cells, grown from stem cells that were harvested from blood donations. Having mastered the simple computer game Pong, where a paddle is moved up and down to send a ball
France experienced its hottest spring on record, the French weather service said on Tuesday, after an exceptional early heat wave that also broke highs for the season in England and Wales. Meteo-France said the average nationwide temperature over March to May was 13.8°C — about 1.7°C above the norm, and surpassing records set in 2011 and 2020. “The warmest spring since records began in 1900,” it said in a bulletin. All three months were warmer than average, but the onset of an “unprecedented heatwave” late last month pushed the mercury to highs typically seen at the height of the summer. “Our country had never
RSS