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When Kim Kap Soo watched live broadcasts of the harrowing Halloween party crush that killed more than 150 people in Seoul last weekend, there was shock and sadness — but also the embarrassed realization that this wasn’t the first time he’d seen South Korea suffer a devastating disaster as a result of official incompetence and safety failures.
“My heart is aching very much. We are among the world’s 10 largest economies, and I totally don’t understand how this can happen in our nation,” said Kim, 73, a retired environmental engineering researcher. “Our public insensitivity to safety is too severe. We should always be careful about everything, but we don’t do so, and I think that’s the biggest problem.”
The crowd crush Saturday in Itaewon, a popular nightlife district, has caused an outpouring of public sympathy toward the dead, mostly in their 20s and 30s, and demands for accountability for the tragedy. But many also share a strong feeling of embarrassment and anger that their country, a cultural and economic powerhouse that has risen from war, poverty and dictatorships, still ignores safety and regulatory issues.
Similar crowd crushes have happened in other developed countries in recent years, but the death counts there were much smaller than in Itaewon, where 156 people died and 173 were injured.
There are growing questions here about why South Korea hasn’t learned its lessons since the 2014 sinking of the ferry Sewol, which killed 304 people — mostly teenagers on a school trip. That disaster also prompted national soul-searching on the country’s failure to enforce safety and regulatory rules.
“When it comes to public safety, I think we aren’t an advanced nation at all, though we might have grown economically,” said Park You Nam, 60, who runs a jewelry shop in Seoul. “I feel really sorry and guilty for those young victims because we all failed to protect them.”
From K-pop superstars BTS and Netflix’s megahit drama “Squid Game” to Samsung-made smartphones and Hyundai cars, South Korea’s recent cultural and economic achievements have been remarkable.
