“Several opportunities to prevent this were missed and all organizations are responsible.”

The final investigation results of the fact-finding committee regarding the Osong underground passage disaster that killed 30 people last year have been released.

He said that all stages of disaster management did not work and that those responsible for administration, including North Chungcheong Province Governor Kim Young-hwan, should be punished.

This is reporter Kim Dae-woong.

◀ Report ▶

At 7:01 a.m. on July 15th last year, the temporary embankment of Mihocheon Bridge.

Six workers are scooping up dirt and piling it on the embankment.

And 50 minutes later, the temporary embankment collapsed and the flooded river flooded the underpass.

17 vehicles, including a city bus, were flooded by suddenly rising water, resulting in a disaster that left 14 people dead and 16 injured.

The citizen fact-finding committee that began the investigation stated that the embankment would not have collapsed if heavy equipment had been deployed at the time.

In addition, he emphasized that there was a period of 30 minutes between the collapse of the embankment and the underpass being flooded, but the disaster occurred because Cheongju City did not properly communicate this information.

[최희천/오송참사시민진상조사위 진상규명팀장]
″The (firefighting) situation room relayed the information to the Cheongju City duty office, but Cheongju City did not convey the information to the North Chungcheong Provincial Office and ultimately took no response measures.″

Poor river management was also a problem.

After the Choryang Underpass disaster in Busan in 2020, Chungcheongbuk-do established flood risk standards, omitting the standards for low-lying areas and assigning the safest grade to Gungpyeong 2 Underpass, which is directly affected by the river.

Cheongju City also excluded the underpass from areas at risk of summer disasters.

There was no control tower.

At the time of the disaster, Chungcheongbuk-do and Cheongju City each created a disaster and safety response headquarters, but did not even share information.

The citizen fact-finding committee concluded that the disaster that occurred in this underpass last year was not a force majeure disaster, and that all relevant organizations were responsible for failing to prevent it several times.

Accordingly, the citizen investigation committee urged the prosecution to quickly investigate the people responsible for the disaster, North Chungcheong Province Governor Kim Young-hwan, Cheongju Mayor Lee Beom-seok, and former Happiness Commissioner Lee Sang-rae.

At the decision hearing held at the Cheongju District Court in relation to the Osong disaster, the prosecution requested the maximum sentence of 6 years in prison for the supervisory leader, who was arrested and indicted on charges of mismanaging the temporary embankment, and 7 years and 6 months in prison for the site director.

This is Daewoong Kim from MBC News.