This isn't the only story from South Korea that I've covered. I've also made a video about the collapse of the Sampoong Department Store in Seoul. Here's a link if you'd like to give it a watch: ua-cam.com/video/mmKk0M7iDYc/v-deo.html
Another South Korean disaster you may not have heard of was the Sealand Youth Training Center Fire in 1999, a "summer camp facility". Just like Daegu, the staff (who were drunk at the time) walked away leaving 23 people to burn instead of helping them escape, nearly all of them children under 10. Corruption, bribery and unsafe material in the construction played a role. I was in Seoul when the Daegu fires happened plus other events: the 2004 arrest of serial _iller Yoo Yeong Chul (who murdered 21 people), and the 2002 "Yangju highway incident" (a gross understatement of the event) where two yank terrorists ... I mean, "soldiers" intentionally ran over two teenage girls walking on the side of a road. I had left when the 2008 Namdaemun fire happened (a pointless arson attack on a historic site). There were also serial arson and vandalism attacks on buddhist temples and violent assaults on buddhists perpetrated by fundamentalist christians. Because the majority in SK are christians, nobody had the decency or honesty to call it religious terrorism.
I would recommend a warm-hearted dramedy 2009 "Cheer Up, Mr. Lee" with the great Cha Seung-won to get the human story with the Daegu fire backdrop. Both touching and funny, it ties to this tragic event. One of my favorite movies ever. Cha Seung-won's acting as a brain-damaged father of a suck child he "didn't know" is brilliant. Please watch to understand how it all ties together.
@@guessundheit6494No offense, but how could people not know about it. That said, the story must be kept alive - corruption, incompetence, captain's cowardice, citizens'-led rescue efforts and the long term lingering aftermath (including rescuers' trauma) should never be forgotten. 💔🖤
So many lives lost due to one person with poor mental health. He stated in the video that he showed remorse for what he did and clearly understood that he had some serious mental issues
Those texts destroyed me. I was already horrified by their shared fate, but those final messages...I'm still crying 5 minutes later. And yes, that one cut deeply. But at least that person got to express his feelings before it was too late.
After this disaster, South Korean subway always teach us how to survive from subway fire, how to open the door, the location of fire extinguishers, and how to get out. It shows from subway commercial screen, boards, and station entrances. This incident was a big shock to South Koreans.
If its okay can i ask how they are teaching this? Like did that release a P.S.A or posters around the subway. Im genuinely curious about how on mass they could teach this or do they just teach employees at the subway?
Do the Trains have manual door release mechanisms and people didnt manage to operate them? Or wasnt that a thing back then? Because thats what confuses me the most. Even before the official evacuation order came, I cant imgine sitting there calmly waiting for the Doors to be opened while watching the Train next to me burning.
@@chaoticcatartistCorrect. There's a lot of PSA posters about subway safety are posted on subway station and subway. And screen monitor in the subway(to show route map, stations, and some commercials) show PSA too.
An additional silver lining to this tragedy was that during the Sewol Ferry disaster, some passengers heard the warnings to stay put and were basically like "fuck that" and evacuated.
Ferry Sewol was on my mind during this, and the Sampoong collapse. It’s horrifying to see a government completely fail at protecting and rescuing its citizens in such a large scale, and then to see it happen again and again. Truly heartbreaking for how many people are/were needlessly affected by negligence and poor safety.
Majority of 'stay put' warnings are coming from somewhere where there is no danger to the operators or security. No way, I go with my gut- we all should. Those that ignored the warnings to stay survived 9/11 too.
@@jonathanlandau-litewski7405 I was just going to post something about 9/11. Those idiots working security, at the doors of the South Tower, telling everyone to stay inside, so as not to further hinder firefighters responding to the North Tower, ended up getting rushed by the growing crowd, when tower two was hit. Might be why the death toll was only 2,700 or so, rather than 10,000. Many made it out before South Towers collapse. Once that happened, the fire chief ordered all his men to pull out, and leave North Tower.
The main reason why this is one of my favourite channels is the respect and restraint in the presentation of these stories. The majority of true horror channels rely on creepy music, horrific imagery and a scary voice to sensationalise these stories, as if the tragedy requires embelishment. In contrast, these videos offer a clear, concise retelling of the events and their consequences, with diagrams and relevant info displayed when necessary. It really emphasises how these aren't ghost stories or creepypastas, but real stories with real people who lost their lives and that alone should be horrifying enough.
I especially respect how he doesn't assign blame or malice where it isn't due. So many people in the comments are calling the 2nd train driver a murderer without a second thought when it's so clearly explained how unfair that assessment is.
I feel bad for the driver of train 1079 getting prison time. He was trying his best to evacuate passengers, and probably never had a single minute of safety training or been given any protocols to follow in case of an emergency. No doubt he was panicking and trying to save his passengers lives. Of course no one in charge got in any trouble..the little guy is always a convenient scapegoat.
Korea has a strong culture of responsibility, not always fairly. Though I do consider it better than the US where avoiding responsibility is the name of the game.
I disagree I'm sorry but involuntary manslaughter exists for a reason, he was in charge of them and whether it was an accident or not. All those people he locked in the train died because of him directly. 5 years sounds fair for 70 lives
Acting out what to do in an emergency can feel silly, but it really does help. When someone is full of fear and adrenaline, they need all the help they can get! I did first aid club as a teen, it had some training days like they do for training paramedics with fake car crashes, realistic injuries etc. it really helped me keep my head and go through the learned steps in real emergencies later in my life, despite not having done the training in years. Even a first aid course helps a lot!
Reflex training really is the best method. When you're in a shocking scenario, you can't think straight. Pre-rehearsed actions can give you precious seconds that mean the difference between life and death.
Definitely. It can be hard to keep your head straight in a shocking and scary situation, but when you've physically practiced and rehearsed what to do, that muscle memory can act without much conscious thought. Safety training and drills may feel silly or annoying, but you'll be grateful for them if/when you're suddenly in the real deal.
I worked for a school that trains medical professionals and it wasn’t a hospital, but it had real facilities that could be used for treating people in disaster scenarios. We had mass casualty drills all the time, so if there was a local incident, we could provide emergency services and care to injured people. I don’t work there anymore, but I believe those drills helped me be able to respond quickly and logically in emergencies (which happens more often than I thought it would now that I have children with a severe lack of self preservation instinct😅).
I work in a job that is (supposed to) involve this. A humorous but informative take seems to really help people retain the information that will ultimately save their life. Unfortunately, I also work in a place that is conceivably a target for a mass shooting (I'm in the US, and in a historical building associated with education, travel, and Civil Rights) and all training doesn't mean much when you introduce guns into the equation. The best case is that people have time to run or fight back.
After hearing so many accounts on this channel where employees were truly negligent and caused many needless deaths, it was shocking to learn of the penalties the two drivers received for a chain of events that were mostly out of their control. It seemed they were relying on their training (or rather, lack of training); guidance from authority figures not present on the scene; and a chaotic situation that probably didn't provide anywhere near enough time for them to properly assess the situation and make proper decisions. Based only on the information presented in this video, I would not have thought prison to be an appropriate punishment for the drivers.
It is definitely a horrific and tragically repeated scenario: higher-ups make the mistakes which lead to or escalate a bad situation, yet those responsible higher-ups manage to shirk the blame to some alternate scapegoat. The blame of the extended loss of lives from the sinking of the USS Indianapolis being put on the ship's captain rather than U.S. naval command who botched the safety of the Indianapolis as well as the search and rescue afterwards is another very notable example of this responsibility-scapegoat-shirking. There definitely needs to be a concerted effort to ensure that in such situations the responsible cannot be permitted to escape justice and those (more or less) innocent do not fall victim to falsified blame. A good start is to always follow the money.
While I can agree that the driver of the first train getting jail time is somewhat bullshit if the metro drivers had no formal safety training and can agree that the higher ups who--of course--seem to have avoided jail definitely deserved more blame, the second driver being jailed is more appropriate just because all of the actions he took were stupid even in a vacuum. He maybe can't be blamed for the master key thing with the doors, though I would think he would know taking it would seal all the doors if they weren't yet opened and thus should have left it instead of properly panicking. But everything else? Between seeing all of the smoke billowing out into the station from the flaming train right next to his and also probably being able to see parts of his own train catching fire, he should have *immediately* let everyone out since basically everyone knows how dangerous fires. Even if the train was fireproof the smoke would just eventually started suffocating everyone anyway, which one has to hope is how everyone in his train died instead of avoidably burning to death due to his sheer idiocy. I'm honestly surprised he only got 5 years for getting 80 people killed.
@@MusicoftheDamned I would argue that not everyone knows how dangerous fires are. Yes, fire can burn... but translating that mentally and emotionally into taking appropriate action is a different story. Watching TV shows and movies about fires, where the hero escapes with death-defying moves, could lull viewers into thinking they, too, can escape unscathed. But watching UA-cam videos about real fires-- one where a crazy person is trying to light up her car and her house, and onlookers try to intervene, while the viewer is waiting seemingly forever for the fire department to arrive, and meanwhile the entire house is going up in flames, and catching the neighboring houses on fire-- Well, that certainly gives perspective. I will also mention the Colorado law enforcement officers who seemingly did not know that leaving their patrol car on train tracks, then handcuffing their vic- I mean, suspect, and placing her in said vehicle on the train tracks, and shutting her in, would lead to a bad outcome. Many people just have no understanding of obvious and imminent danger. Oh, and I'll also mention my neighbors that shoot off illegal skyrockets, which explode over my house and drop bits and pieces of flammable, explosive, and toxic debris all over my house and yard, in summer during a California drought when it's not legal to water your lawn enough to keep it alive, let alone from catching fire. I don't think they really understand what would happen if their house caught fire with their generous stash of incendiary explosives inside. I do, which is why I hose down my yard and house every fourth of July. To heck with water restrictions!
@@EXROBOWIDOW I mean, you can argue that, and I see where you're coming from, especially as someone else who lives in California and thus had and still has to deal with idiots shooting off illegal fireworks multiple times a year every goddamn year, even when it was bone dry. But all those examples really do is highlight what we all already know in that "common sense" isn't actually that common and that *a lot* of people can be *really* fucking dumb, even professionals. Both that George Carlin line about intelligence of "the average person" and that line from the first _Men in Black_ about "A person is smart. People being dumb, panicky animals and you know it" come to mind here as they often do on this channel and so many others (and, unfortunately, real life). In fact, American cops are especially a bad counterexample for this since even if you have positive feelings towards them overall, there's at least that one Supreme Court case that literally discourages police departments from hiring officers who are too smart. Even if IQ and IQ tests are largely bullshit with a dark history based in equally bullshit eugenics, that's still *pretty* telling. Mind you, I *don't* think driver #2 should have gotten life or anything. I also understand that some people freeze up even when they know what to do and especially if they don't. And yet it's still pretty clear that his various actions and mostly inactions are what got almost 80 people avoidably killed, which is why I disagreed with the OP that he's blameless unlike driver #1--who largely is but got almost as mich time--even if the higher ups who got away with it--like they almost always do--are *also* to blame.
I’m up there with ya. I’m a fireman. We do our damndest to keep people and property safe, and understandably things happen, and we try to mitigate that, with fire safety education and building codes and inspections. Then you have these (colourful language omitted) running ‘round setting random things on fire for (more colourful language omitted) reasons. Makes our job harder, puts people, property, and us at risk, for no tangible benefit. And those are just stationary fires. Our area has brush, but not forest fires, so when I see the fires out west, Fort McMurray, California, all that gorgeous forest destroyed (unnecessarily, as opposed to normal cycles), if nothing else, breaks my heart.
@@jaysmith1408 thank you for what you do. The firefighters have saved my neighborhood from destruction many times. I’ve moved to a new state with better forest management protocols, and less degenerates who want to burn things.
Fires get my anxiety ratcheted way up. Equestrian Camp during one of the then worst fires. The camp was constantly reeking of smoke and the horses were stressed out. Lightning bolt hit a dry mountainside, and the rest of the day, smoke was drifting into the amusement park I worked at. We could see the flames on the other side of the ridge. Summer job. We started with a group question, “What would you grab if you had to evacuate for a wildfire?” From the windows, we could see the mass of smoke of the Indian Gulch Fire. I went over to where we’d placed our bags, picked up two, led my old half-blind dog over, “I grabbed these this morning.” Coworkers were immediately offering me and my dog a place to stay. The fire had suddenly gotten Real.
Being trapped in a burning vehicle is a nightmare of mine, reminds me of the story of those kids in the school bus in the USA which has also been covered on this channel
Are teh windows used in such vehicles actually glass or what? Just wandering if there is a tool you could take with you to smash the windows in case of fire or emergency.
@@chatteyj In every version of train and bus I know in Germany, all windows are glass, but there are emergency hammers in every carriage, very visible to everyone. Some windows have special gaskets and markings where to smash, and a small sign reading "In case of danger, smash the glass.".
@@chatteyjno, it's glass but I think it's laminated and strengthened safety glass. Been on a bus that has a had a rock thrown at it and the window shatters a bit but it stayed in one piece. The windows on our buses have little stickers telling you to strike there with the little hammer attached to the frame to escape.
It's tragic that it took such an enormous disaster to make the Korean Subway network as safe as it is today, but it's good to see how seriously this was taken in the wake of the tragedy. RIP to all 192 victims
@@AlanTuringWannabe Humans are only so capable of forward-thinking. "Safety regulations are written in blood" is, more often than not, referencing the fact that we're not particularly good at figuring out what the biggest risks in a given scenario are until they've already happened. In order to learn from your mistakes, you have to make them first.
Those text messages really got to me. It's heartbreaking but beautiful, in a way, that they were able to message their loved ones one last time. A total tragedy, but at least their families got, hopefully, a little bit of solace. Thanks for the video, by the way. You tell all these stories with such pathos and logos, and they're always so compelling.
I am a subway driver in Berlin Germany. During my training to become a subway driver in 1993, I was taught to immediately drive through the station without instructions if smoke or fire were seen. This safety behavior is also regularly trained in the simulator.
That's what I would have done, if I were the driver of the second train. If you see fire or a lot of smoke just blast on through the station, and proceed to the next one. If the power is lost, for any reason, while inside the tunnel, open the doors, so everyone can escape the train, and flee down the tunnel. Kind of strange, the second driver didn't go with instinct, and just leave the station quickly.
I went to Berlin before the pandemic and enjoyed taking the U-Bahn. I used to live in Chicago which has a good L/subway and bus system. I live in Texas now and driving is horrible. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
That's because in korea they always wait for instructions from higher ups instead of using their own brains and avoid horrible incidents :( for ex. see sewol ferry and itaewon at halloween, koreans are too afraid of standing out and make their own decisions because it could fall back on them and their family (which it does because the higher ups are always right and never at fault) :(
After this and Sewol Ferry tragedy, South Koreans now never listen to official announcements tellling them to stay put, and just high tail it when something feels about to go wrong. On one occasion people just opened up the doors and ran to the next stations through the tunnel.
@@stormisuedonym4599but it is also quite a reasonable response. If authority figures telling people to stay put caused more deaths than people not staying put, then it is probably much better to not listen to similar authority figures telling you to stay put in case of emergencies. Sure, situational awareness is always necessary, it matters in what way you don't stay put.
@@FungeHuckerdo you not see the difference between a life threatening fire that you can run from and a life threatening disease that spreads through travel?
Please consider doing an episode about the Winecoff Hotel fire in Atlanta Dec 7, 1946. The owner advertised his hotel as “absolutely fireproof” 119 people lost their lives
Did you know 5 years after towering inferno a top floor fire in a 40 story high rise resulted in power to elevators knocked out everyone evacuated by stairs fire chief ordered only top 5 floors evacuated but everybody evacuated saying no towering infernos for them the temperature outside that day was 5 degrees and windy it seems like maybe there should be more movies like that and that will make people more aware of the dangers
I'm so sick of hearing innocent people have to suffer because someone didn't get the help they needed. "I was mistreated, let's go kill almost 200 people who had nothing to do with it!" but yeah it's also shameful how mental issues are treated around the world too.
Yeah, it's definitely not a black-and-white issue. People 100% deserve access to healthcare (including mental healthcare), but that in NO way excuses anyone from harming others. It's just a shitty situation all the way around.
Yeah... If that had been America, someone probably would have gone up in a high place with a rifle at some public event, or shot up a school. In Korea, some a7sehole sets fire to an Underground train full of people. Someplace else, they'll mow into a crowd of shoppers with a lorry or truck of some sort, or fly an airliner into a mountain, or the sea... In most places now, you can't buy petrol in just any container, and I'm pretty sure that most places in America, even, you can't just wander into a gunstore and buy a gun without filling out some forms, or at the _very_ least, showing some I/D. Many shopping streets and open~air marketplaces are now protected by bollards and air regulatory agencies have tightened up cockpit manning procedures and mandated psychological check~ups of pilots; and I think that all of these are sensible measures. However, the fact that 'nutters' have found so many ways of making innocent members of the public pay for their grievances and obsessions should be a warning (to gun - control advocates, for example,) that such measures can at best be only an inconvenience to homicidal 'whackjobs' (using the clinically preferred term), or perhaps prevent them from acting on the spur of the moment. You're always going to be faced with the human ingenuity factor (and saving exceptions like Ted 'Unabomber' Kascynski, few of these people turn out to be Einsteins!) Not to absolve the taxi driver of blame for a second (unless his stroke kinda 'burnt out' his sense of right and wrong, which I sort of doubt), but I have to wonder whether he wasn't correct in saying that he'd been let down by his doctors, and the South Korean mental health system. Indeed, he, himself, seems to have proven his whole point! To quote the Captain from the Paul Newman film, 'Cool Hand Luke', "There are some people you just can't reach..." And it's true that we used to lock up too many people too readily and for far too long in psychiatric facilities -- but letting this guy out when they did seems like one Hell of a goof!
@@richiehoyt8487 yes, there are forms (and ID required) to purchase a firearm required to be filled out. Form 4473. The licensed gun stores turn over these forms to the ATF for record.
Every one of my korean friends know about this fire and told me about it. From the way they describe it, it was a big scnadal and every city in the country revised their security measures after that. It's literally the foundation of how modern fire safety measures in korean underground transport are handled. They seem to have taken the aftermath very seriously. Though it does feel like the direvers were scapegoats to what was a clear attempt from the local authority to cut corners on their tranport system, in a period of fast growth (which is a typical issue in building management and construction planning during the 90s, apparently). A special mention for the fact that you pronounced the name "Choi" properly, since it trips a lot of people up (as well as every other korean word in this video that were very decently pronounced).
Thank you for that typo, my aunt and I have now coined the phrase, 'if you think there's about to be a scnadle, skedaddle!' And yeah, the driver of that first train _absolutely_ got shoved under the train in getting a prison sentence; he had fuckall for training, and was busy evacuating people! The second train's driver probably also didn't deserve prison, but he probably should've been barred from working in public transport again. The dispatcher who told him to flee without evacuating his passengers first; _that_ guy needed prison!
@@ShadowDragon8685 Agree completely! To add insult to injury for the first driver, it's absolutely unacceptable that the fire alert system didn't automatically communicate about the fire! Noone in their right mind would waste time telling the central about a fire, when the fire alarm is already blaring.
I know that the fire found its genesis in a completely different set of circumstances, but with an example like King’s Cross; revealing everything that can go wrong with fire in a subway station, it’s a wonder that some of the highly priced lessons learned in London that day, were not heeded worldwide. Particularly in this case, with a subway system having not even yet been constructed, at the time of the disaster at King’s Cross station.
That’s too bad. However, in Korea’s defense, the unfortunate reality of the situation, even in well-funded communities and industries, is something that has been dubbed, “a tombstone mentality towards safety”. This refers to an attitude where serious safety improvements or regulations are only implemented after a tragic incident or an appalling loss of life has occurred; a reactive rather than proactive approach to safety, where actions are taken too late, after preventable accidents have already resulted in fatalities. I have been a longtime watcher of 'Air Crash Investigation' (you can find them all over UA-cam and Dailymotion, sometimes called 'Mayday'), and it’s amazing how many mishaps and catastrophes have been so easily preventable, so many missed opportunities. The crash of the Turkish Airlines flight 981, McDonnell Douglas DC-10 is absolutely one of the most galling. 346 lives lost over an aircraft design flaw, of which McDonnell Douglas knew about even back when jetliner type was going through testing, and then later, one which they had made an agreement with the FAA to fix, after a near disaster over Detroit, with American Airlines flight 96. It’s a sad state of affairs in transportation, engineering, construction, infrastructure, etc, where coffins being filled is the only thing that lights a fire under their asses. If you’re at all interested, here’s the UA-cam link to the aforementioned 'Air Crash Investigation'/'Mayday' episode. It’s an extraordinary documentary series, and this was an excellent episode. m.ua-cam.com/video/s8kqN4rf7Uc/v-deo.html
This was the incident one of the students on the Sewol Ferry was referring to, that they were telling the people to stay put only to have them die. She was so right.
I’ve been on the Korean subway (in 2023, so obviously a long time after this) and it was actually so amazing. It has fast wifi, everything was in Korean and in English, and the chairs are colour-coded for who can sit in them (like disabled, elderly , etc) I was really impressed.
I assume you mean seoul, I've also being on the seoul one and completely agree but having been to deagu recently the safey measures are no where near as good as seoul and quite pitiful in comparision
What's also pleasant is the air-conditioning during the hot and humid summers and gentle heating during the cold winter days! But I heard recently that the Seoul trains are now taking their seats out to accommodate more standing passengers.
I’m an American and lived in Seoul for many years. The Korean subway is exceptional and puts those in the U.S. to shame. I ride the DC Metro now and it’s god awful. The Korean airports put ours to shame also…they are so modern and nice.
I’m glad they learned lessons from the tragedy and altered procedures and construction to prevent similar incidents of the unwell or evil people from harming the general population.
There are certainly psychopaths who would do this without any reason, but please don’t stop your thought process with „evil people“. There’s more to it! The taxi driver was in very bad shape mentally. Mental health is a major factor in these kinds of attacks to public people. It’s important to have a proper, and big enough mental health system. And access to it for all people, regardless their social or cultural position.
Nope. That fire was in 2002, I was in South Korea when it happened. Look up the 2008 Namdaemun fire, where another selfish mentally ill individual caused millions in damage. The difference then was Namdaemun Gate being a historic site that was destroyed, no people were hurt. The Namdaemun Gate is in the middle of a major road in Seoul, there's no way to access it while traffic is moving.
@@stormisuedonym4599this Like I get the dude was mentally unstable but he still was trying to light up containers of gas on a train He was evil, just because you’re mentally unstable doesn’t make you not guilty and or evil
He panicked. There was no need to take the key with him but he likely did this out of muscle memory (it will have been some procedure to take the key out when leaving and handing over to another driver, I’m guessing)
Empathise with the guy a little - he likely never intended to cause the entrapment of passengers or the abandonment of them. He almost certainly didn't realise the doors hadn't opened in time. In the moment, anxious and in the dark about the situation, he reached out to dispatchers for instructions, likely was not adequately trained for emergencies of this nature, and in following the instructions his first act was to open the doors. This can take a few seconds to begin, but in his mind, hit button, doors open, end of story. Second, to take the key, almost certainly out of pure habitual instinct coupled with a misunderstanding (his failure to realise that the doors weren't far enough into the sequence to continue opening). Many people, given the same situation and the same training, would have performed similarly poorly in judgement.
@@OutbackCatgirl I guess some ppl are just better in dreadful situations...not this train driver unfortunately... Plenty of vid's of ppl in charge doing their best to save their customers or passengers .. I couldn't sleep at night if I knew my passengers cooked to death... 😢😢
I like the way you tell about the people. Also you always emphasize the positive changes that come from horrible tragedies. I know it doesn’t bring back those lost, but it's good to know that sometimes people actually do learn and improve.
I hope one day you'll cover the Granville Train disaster in Australia. I'd love to get your insight into the circumstances around it and what changed afterwards.
There is an Email address in the video description where you can send him suggestions on which incidents he could cover. He reads and answers those emails.
I was in South Korea last year and was very impressed by the safety information videos on the Seoul underground system. In particular I liked that it wasn’t simply a question of telling people to get out, but showed how to open emergency doors and use fire extinguishers. I had not been aware of the Daegu fire and had wondered if this was an outcome of military enlistment in that any train would be bound to have a good proportion of men who have had military training and would presumably have been trained to deal with emergencies.
Hi, I would highly appreciate if you could make a video about the following disaster. This reminded me of the train disaster in Žasliai, Lithuania on april 4, 1975. I made a video about it but you do a way better job, and I found it to be very deserving to be heard more. It is relatively unknown because of the location. There were 20 fatalities and at least 80 injured, but that number is suspected to be way higher because of the suppression of news by the government at the time. What makes the case even more horrific is the severe nature of many injuries, due to the leaking fuel that burned on the clothes of many passengers.
I would then also like to see a video on the Harmelen train collision, on January 8, 1962, which, to this day, is the deadliest railroad accident in the Netherlands.
Between this, the Sewol Ferry and Flight 123, Asia seems like the worst place to be a victim of an accident. They never seem to care about rescuing survivors
Psychiatric hospitals really don’t do much for its patients, 99% of the time, world wide, they are to contain the patients rather than treat them. They don’t really get help, they’re just dumped there. It’s no surprise this often makes mental patients even more disturbed.
Many people simply can't be helped without the use of medication, and only the very worst patients can be compulsorily given them. You see this all the time in the United States, with thousands of insane people who can't function normally but who refuse to take medication. Many end up permanently homeless.
@@derek96720 There are plenty of patients in psychiatric hospitals who take their medication. What they also need is therapy, and general emotional support and support in building better life experience in general. Just throwing pills at a mentally ill person and expecting things to magically get better doesn’t work, this is what most psychiatric hospitals already do anyway.
@@derek96720There is a movement to bring back state institutions and make it easier to involuntarily commit people. I suspect the effort is an attempt to deal with the unhoused and I’d be lying if I said that it didn’t make me uncomfortable.
American Soldier here, stationed in Daegu 2015-2016. Rode on that subway many times. In general the train system in South Korea is GREAT, but I guess some lessons are learned the hard way.
Too concerned with time, not concerned enough with safety. Driver of the second train reported seeing smoke, Control were aware of a fire. He should've been stopped outside the station and left in the tunnel bore. Furthermore when he saw the extent of the fire he should've omitted his station stop, without instruction or hesitation. It sounds like a lack of experience and training
And the person who started the fire on purpose isn’t? The control could definitely have done a much better job, and they definitely made things much worse, but let’s not forget this incident started with deliberate arson/terrorism rather than someone’s incompetence (that would be the Sewol Ferry Disaster).
It is possible that he was not told that the train was full of passengers. It was up to the driver to apply the 'get out' instruction to everyone, not just himself.
The death toll in too many accidents in East Asia comes down to people not using their own initiative but deferring to management for instructions. This deferential attitude, an intrinsic part of those societies, can be highly dangerous in these situations.
When the second train arrived, it should have continued on instead of stopping next to the smoking/burning train. This was terrible judgment by the driver of the second train.
Hey Facinating Horror creator, just wanted to say thank you for making such awesome films! I really enjoy them andI have learned so much. Please keep making, I watch at least 1 per day so I’m quickly getting through your catalog 😂 #1 fave channel! ❤️
The earlier gas explosion that claimed 101 lives, including a classroom's worth of middle schoolers might be worth covering too, since it apparently lead to changes in safety protocols for tunnel construction?
"I’m sorry that I was mad at you this morning it wasn’t what i meant honey I love you forever" "Without oppa you must not skip meals and listen to your parents.. get itㅋㅋ and don’t wait for me I won’t come" "Oppa is in an emergency I think I need to be away. Don’t wait for me and go back. Alright? I love you" "Study hard and be a good person. Dad is sorry" The last message of the victims are heartbreaking caused by one man selfishness
The train driver wasn’t selfish, he had assumed the doors were open, and was unaware the key removal would close them. He was at worst negligent, and should’ve checked, but the amount of smoke would’ve made hanging around to check harder than it sounds
@@Prohass Remind me not to trust you if you're in charge! His passengers welfare meant nothing to him, he should have checked the doors were open... I get it was smokey, and he was probably super scared, but he let over 100 roast alive... Not a stand up thing to do...
@@johnnysilverhand7274Kim Dae Wan is the only one to blame here he's the root caused that perished 190 lives by a failed suicide in all places in public subway that clearly he wants others to drag to his suffering the 2 subway drivers are also victim the 2 caught and overwhelmed in the situation in which that they cannot comprehend and cant think a proper judgement remember their lives are also in danger unfortunately its fatal judgement of the 2 drivers caused by panic
I always appreciate how you not only give excellent descriptions of the events and keep away from the sensationalism, but also remind us about the victims. They were real people, who had families and loves ones, and are not just another set of statistics.
I thought I'd bury this in the replies, but...i also suffered intense harm from staff when I was admitted to a psychiatric facility and I'm still dealing with the effects to this day. I might be able to imagine a little bit what that man went through and what it did to his mind at his most vulnerable moments. I'm grateful to have people around me who care and listen. It's truly horrifying to consider where (or who) I would be without them.
@itsdrgrandpa agreed the mental health system has alot to be desired. Especially the stigma and hatred for certain disorders I've seen a few therapists in a attempt to heal my disorder the down side is if you're not a danger to yourself they go you're fine and toss you back out even if you know you're not. Takes a lot of searching to find one who understands and will help.
apparently, from what i watched on a korean show, they mentioned that the material of the trains were flammable due to the government trying to cut cost. they found out about the unbelievable low budget train and iirc the government departments pointing fingers at each other to avoid punishments.
This was a great video as away FH. However, this is one of my personal terrors. The idea of being trapped in a burning anything scares the crap out of me. I have smoke alarms, fire extinguishers every where in my house including one in my car. I even have a fire ladder in my upstairs bedroom where no one stays.
Those final texts are chilling and give a personal touch to such a massive tragedy. A reminder for everyone that a new day is not guaranteed to anyone. Makes you wonder what yours might say.
Wow. I’ve been watching these videos for a couple of years and this is the first time someone who was directly responsible for losing lives was punished. All the rest are like “despite ignoring all safety regulations the company was fined $1,000” and “although the captain lost hundreds of lives through negligence, he was allowed to retain his license”.
Scapegoating employees who had no training for the situation they found themselves in, and even following direct orders during the situation, doesn't mean 'someone who was directly responsible' was punished. None of the people who authorised cheap plastic interiors instead of fire-retardant materials were punished. None of the people who skimped on employee training time and costs by not allowing for proper evacuation protocols to be designed and practices was punished. Instead it was the untrained employees who took the blame for the CEO's who put them in that situation. And those cheapskates who went for profit, those who were responsible for the MEANS with which employees have to ensure the safety of their passengers, were in the clear from any blame.
The drivers made mistakes in the panic of the moment, one doing his best to save people, one following the instructions he was given. Yes, their actions contributed to the death toll, but they were doing the best they could in an emergency, in a panic, with inappropriate training. The people who should have taken RESPONSIBILITY were the people who made decisions to save money, decisions that were NOT in the heat of the moment.
I have listened to many of these documentaries, and have great appreciation of the background detail work preceding each one. Added to which the measured voice over is meticulous, and is a great relief from many American versions. Thank you for the hard work .
South Korea has a lot of horrible tragedies like this. The Halloween crush was particularly insane. The weirdest thing about that is most people went there to see the western expats just walking around in their costumes. The tiktok, photobrag culture there is seriously potent and toxic and will only get worse. The bigger the crowd the more people flock to whatever is going on just to say they were there.
That's because the government believes that health and safety is a socialist concept. Actually it is, but that doesn't make it invalid. The capitalist mindset us, "they had a choice to use the subway or not", I.e it's always the victim's fault.
6:55 Fires like that are almost impossible to fight once they get big. Mostly because you can only do a little because of the confined space. With a big fire the little you can fight it often isn't enough. That's why usually fire in tunnels and other sealed off places are addressed much more quickly since you can't escalate your response if the fire does.
Especially because in a tunnel environment (1) smoke fills tunnels until it finds an outlet, which generally immediately provides a stack effect, and (2) the surrounding concrete or rock both reflects heat back into the fire and radiates intense heat for hours after the fire is out.
It's because you realize what is really what's most important to you at the end and it's something universal. You think of those you love most and want the best for them.
Thanks for always following through with the impacts that these tragedies had. I appreciate hearing that new safety measures were added to make trains safer.
Fires are now one of my biggest fears. After having a small trash can catch fire at work and filled the entire 30,000 sqft building with smoke, I can imagine how scary and serious a real fire can be. I feel so bad for all these people 😢
This is such a great example of "first story" vs "second story". First story: man starts fire, drivers don't do what needs to be done to keep passengers safe: drivers get jailtime" Second story: man starts fire, drivers don't react because they think their trains are fireproof, drivers remove keys because that is how they are trained, now knowing that this stops doors from opening, drivers don't report fires because they think an automatic system would have done this. Yes, if you want to be a moron then you could say that the driver's actions led to the deaths. I say "moron: quite deliberately because they did not start the fire. They did not design the master key so that it makes the doors impossible to open from the inside. They were justified in thinking there would be a fire alarm system. They are justified in thinking there would be fire-supression in the cabs. The "first story" tries to blame a person and punish them, because anything that goes wrong is *wrongly* considered to be an intentional act by the guilty party. The "second story" *rightly* assumes that nobody involved did anything that they did not think to be the right thing to do at the time. The driver who took the key was trained to do so, always. He was not trained to leave the key in place in case of fire, because he would had left the key if he had. The first story makes people hide their actions for fear of punishment, making the whole system less safe. The second story brings problems in the system to light and if you DONT punish the people who did what they thought was best in a situation that they had no control over, then they will tell you what's wrong with the system so you can prevent it from happening again. Punishing people feels good and it needs to be done *when people intentionally do bad things* but if you punish a person for making an honest mistake, all they will do is hide the mistake next time and you will never know that your system has a serious, potentially deadly flaw.
The driver of 1080 and his superiors were charged for trying to cover up his actions as well. They found him at the head office and he and his bosses altered documents.
At the station there is a memorial, along with information about the disaster. They also display many items that were burned during the fire. It breaks my heart every time I see it. On a side note, Line 3 isn't an underground subway at all, it's a completely above-ground monorail line. I'm not sure if that was in response to the disaster or if that was always the plan, but it's a nice way to see parts of the city.
I admire the way you can present a complex event in a concise way. It's a perfect balance of fact providing and storytelling. Objectivity, but not lacking human warmth. Consistent quality videos. 👍👍
AT 8:58, you can see the facial expressions on 5 of the firefighters. It brought tears to my eyes. How horrific it must have been for those men. They probably won't forget as long as they live...
The South Korea metro is a safe and efficient mode of transportation. I rely on it heavily for the majority of my travels here. They play a lot of fire safety videos on the screens in the train cars, which I can now better understand the reasoning.
The texts sent during the disaster were heartbreaking. It was just another normal day for those civilians, but such a small act can lead up to one of the worst disasters in history. Here are some texts sent during the disaster "I slept well. The weather today is clear." -Sent from soon-to-be wife to soon-to-be husband, 7 minutes before the disaster. "I'm on the subway right now and I'm almost at the office. I'll prepare delicious dinner for you after work!" -Sent from wife to husband, 4 minutes before the disaster. "...I'm passing Jungangno station soon, I'll be here soon so wait a little." -Sent from junior student to senior student, 3 minutes before the disaster. ___________________ *(Fire breaks out)* ------------------------------- "Oppa there's a fire! I can't breathe because of all the smoke. The door is locked, I can't leave..." -Sent from girlfriend to boyfriend, 2 minutes after the disaster. "Honey, honey! A fire broke out but the door won't open. I can't breathe. Help me please... I love you honey, I want to see my kids..." -Sent from wife to husband, 8 minutes after the disaster. "Oppa has some stuff to do so I'll have to go somewhere. Don't wait for me, ok? ily" -Sent from boyfriend to girlfriend, 19 minutes after the disaster. "What would do if I suddenly stopped existing tomorrow? Just asking cuz I'm curious lol" -Sent from older sibling to younger sibling, 21 minutes after the disaster. "A fire broke out, guess I'll go to heaven before you. Hallelujah...amen." -Sent from a church deacon to his wife, 29 minutes after the disaster. "You escaped, right mother? I'm okay so... don't be sorry. I love you." -Sent from son to his mother, 50 minutes after the disaster. They were together on the subway but they lost each other. The mother managed to survive but unfortunately, her son didn't. "Hyeonseok... I think it's over for your noona. Please be a good child for mommy and daddy." -Call between an older sister and her younger brother. "Sorry, I can't give you the bag and shoes... I wanted to cook tonkatsu for you today... sorry. I love you, daughter." -Sent from mother to her child. "I'm sorry for being mad and leaving you this morning. I didn't mean it. I love you forever." "Even if oppa doesn't exist anymore, eat well and listen to your parents... you understand? Also don't wait for me, I'm not coming." "I'm getting sick of our relationship lol, we're breaking up lmao"
Always so horrifying to hear about how a single person's carelessness can lead to the deaths of so many. We effect each other's lives in more ways than we think, quite literally at times.
I’m glad that a lot of these disasters do have a positive ending. Like how all the protocols were switched and things were done differently to prevent anything like this happening again. But also, it looks like that we need to take a better look at the care we provide our People that are suffering from mental illness. And apparently that is worldwide. Because if the man who actually started, the fire, would have been treated better at the mental hospital that he was at, he would not have had any reason to see revenge. Rest in peace to all those that lost their life in this tragedy.
Rapid decline in a human's mental health is especially frightening because we are all susceptible to it no matter how sane you are now. This fact of course doesn't excuse what this man did, it's just a reminder on how seriously we need to take this topic. Having hospitals equipped with a department specifically there to address this problem is a great start but we still have so much to learn about what makes us all tick.
It’s really terrifying and makes me feel ill to think about that there are people who had to die just for the rest of us to learn what to do to prevent such events presented in these videos on this channel from happening again.
This is my wife's hometown, and having been there quite a bit, I don't think they learned much from this. Even newer transportation in SK more resembles Soviet tech than anything many people would consider safe or modern. There are multiple deeper cultural issues at work here.
I would recommend a warm-hearted dramedy 2009 "Cheer Up, Mr. Lee" with the great Cha Seung-won to get the human story with the Daegu fire backdrop. Both touching and funny, it ties to this tragic event. One of my favorite movies ever. Cha Seung-won's acting as a brain-damaged father of a suck child he "didn't know" is brilliant. Please watch to understand how it all ties together.
Something that many people don't know, liquid gasoline isn't flammable but the vapors are explosively so. If the container hadn't ruptured and allowed vapor to form, the fire most likely would not have started. This is a takeaway that is important in everyday life, and the reason it's so important to be aware of how flammable gas fumes are when you're fueling your vehicle.
This is why, in a situation where it seems like your life is in imminent danger, you don't listen to other people, and get out of Dodge! This is definitely not the first time, on this channel alone, I've heard of people being told to stay put, only to pay for that order with their lives. If anything, this has taught me in situations like this, you need to be responsible for your own life and not wait for someone else to make the evacuation decision for you.
Some things are the same no matter where you live. These two train drivers go to jail when they had nothing to do with the problem. One was saving lives and the other was following orders. You notice how those high up in power and actually making the decisions received no jail time or negative consequences. I'm glad that they fixed the subway and made it safer but we all need to start holding those in power accountable.
Yeah that wait here for instructions, stay inside, stay seated stuff happens all over. Grenfell Towers people got that line but they knew they lived in a death trap so lots didn't wait.
Shocking. I’ve never heard of this tragedy, yet so many lost their lives. Sometimes even large scale tragedies, such as this, don’t make it into the news headlines in Europe. That’s sad.
It was made worse by the fact that they were in such a confined space being underground so there was less room to escape then if they had been on an open air platform
This isn't the only story from South Korea that I've covered. I've also made a video about the collapse of the Sampoong Department Store in Seoul. Here's a link if you'd like to give it a watch: ua-cam.com/video/mmKk0M7iDYc/v-deo.html
Another South Korean disaster you may not have heard of was the Sealand Youth Training Center Fire in 1999, a "summer camp facility". Just like Daegu, the staff (who were drunk at the time) walked away leaving 23 people to burn instead of helping them escape, nearly all of them children under 10. Corruption, bribery and unsafe material in the construction played a role.
I was in Seoul when the Daegu fires happened plus other events: the 2004 arrest of serial _iller Yoo Yeong Chul (who murdered 21 people), and the 2002 "Yangju highway incident" (a gross understatement of the event) where two yank terrorists ... I mean, "soldiers" intentionally ran over two teenage girls walking on the side of a road. I had left when the 2008 Namdaemun fire happened (a pointless arson attack on a historic site). There were also serial arson and vandalism attacks on buddhist temples and violent assaults on buddhists perpetrated by fundamentalist christians. Because the majority in SK are christians, nobody had the decency or honesty to call it religious terrorism.
Of course we want to watch it!
I would recommend a warm-hearted dramedy 2009 "Cheer Up, Mr. Lee" with the great Cha Seung-won to get the human story with the Daegu fire backdrop. Both touching and funny, it ties to this tragic event. One of my favorite movies ever. Cha Seung-won's acting as a brain-damaged father of a suck child he "didn't know" is brilliant. Please watch to understand how it all ties together.
@@guessundheit6494No offense, but how could people not know about it. That said, the story must be kept alive - corruption, incompetence, captain's cowardice, citizens'-led rescue efforts and the long term lingering aftermath (including rescuers' trauma) should never be forgotten. 💔🖤
A story about the gas explosion you mentioned would be great.
"i'm sorry I was mad at you this morning I didn't mean it" absolutely killed me man... RIP to all the victims
So many lives lost due to one person with poor mental health. He stated in the video that he showed remorse for what he did and clearly understood that he had some serious mental issues
Those texts destroyed me. I was already horrified by their shared fate, but those final messages...I'm still crying 5 minutes later. And yes, that one cut deeply. But at least that person got to express his feelings before it was too late.
That absolutely broke me too.
Same
Yeah, I couldn't stop from tearing up seeing that one.
After this disaster, South Korean subway always teach us how to survive from subway fire, how to open the door, the location of fire extinguishers, and how to get out. It shows from subway commercial screen, boards, and station entrances. This incident was a big shock to South Koreans.
❤ 🇺🇲🤝🇰🇷
Thank you for sharing this. It’s good that they are now educating people on safety.
I just hope that nobody ever needs to use this information.
🙂🐿🌈❤️
If its okay can i ask how they are teaching this? Like did that release a P.S.A or posters around the subway. Im genuinely curious about how on mass they could teach this or do they just teach employees at the subway?
Do the Trains have manual door release mechanisms and people didnt manage to operate them? Or wasnt that a thing back then? Because thats what confuses me the most. Even before the official evacuation order came, I cant imgine sitting there calmly waiting for the Doors to be opened while watching the Train next to me burning.
@@chaoticcatartistCorrect. There's a lot of PSA posters about subway safety are posted on subway station and subway. And screen monitor in the subway(to show route map, stations, and some commercials) show PSA too.
An additional silver lining to this tragedy was that during the Sewol Ferry disaster, some passengers heard the warnings to stay put and were basically like "fuck that" and evacuated.
Ignoring being told to stay put is the main message from this channel overall, I think.
Unless there's only one exit.
@@Liusila
Ferry Sewol was on my mind during this, and the Sampoong collapse. It’s horrifying to see a government completely fail at protecting and rescuing its citizens in such a large scale, and then to see it happen again and again. Truly heartbreaking for how many people are/were needlessly affected by negligence and poor safety.
Majority of 'stay put' warnings are coming from somewhere where there is no danger to the operators or security. No way, I go with my gut- we all should. Those that ignored the warnings to stay survived 9/11 too.
@@jonathanlandau-litewski7405 I was just going to post something about 9/11.
Those idiots working security, at the doors of the South Tower, telling everyone to stay inside,
so as not to further hinder firefighters responding to the North Tower, ended up getting rushed by the growing crowd, when tower two was hit. Might be why the death toll was only 2,700 or so, rather than 10,000. Many made it out before South Towers collapse. Once that happened, the fire chief ordered all his men to pull out, and leave North Tower.
The main reason why this is one of my favourite channels is the respect and restraint in the presentation of these stories. The majority of true horror channels rely on creepy music, horrific imagery and a scary voice to sensationalise these stories, as if the tragedy requires embelishment.
In contrast, these videos offer a clear, concise retelling of the events and their consequences, with diagrams and relevant info displayed when necessary. It really emphasises how these aren't ghost stories or creepypastas, but real stories with real people who lost their lives and that alone should be horrifying enough.
Man's the Wikipedia of UA-cam. As neutral as it should get.
I agree. I appreciate the straightforward telling of the disaster without the dramatics.
I especially respect how he doesn't assign blame or malice where it isn't due. So many people in the comments are calling the 2nd train driver a murderer without a second thought when it's so clearly explained how unfair that assessment is.
Totally agree!
@@zonkedmcWikipedia neutral... lol
I feel bad for the driver of train 1079 getting prison time. He was trying his best to evacuate passengers, and probably never had a single minute of safety training or been given any protocols to follow in case of an emergency. No doubt he was panicking and trying to save his passengers lives. Of course no one in charge got in any trouble..the little guy is always a convenient scapegoat.
Korea has a strong culture of responsibility, not always fairly. Though I do consider it better than the US where avoiding responsibility is the name of the game.
The two drivers and their bosses were blamed as much for the loss of life as they were for trying to cover it up and skirt responsibility.
@@blackroberts6290 Yeah, colonialism is to blame. Go play another game of “Among us” and try not to think too much, you might hurt yourself.
I disagree I'm sorry but involuntary manslaughter exists for a reason, he was in charge of them and whether it was an accident or not. All those people he locked in the train died because of him directly. 5 years sounds fair for 70 lives
@@TranscendentaLobo27 okay
Acting out what to do in an emergency can feel silly, but it really does help. When someone is full of fear and adrenaline, they need all the help they can get! I did first aid club as a teen, it had some training days like they do for training paramedics with fake car crashes, realistic injuries etc. it really helped me keep my head and go through the learned steps in real emergencies later in my life, despite not having done the training in years. Even a first aid course helps a lot!
Reflex training really is the best method. When you're in a shocking scenario, you can't think straight. Pre-rehearsed actions can give you precious seconds that mean the difference between life and death.
Definitely. It can be hard to keep your head straight in a shocking and scary situation, but when you've physically practiced and rehearsed what to do, that muscle memory can act without much conscious thought. Safety training and drills may feel silly or annoying, but you'll be grateful for them if/when you're suddenly in the real deal.
I worked for a school that trains medical professionals and it wasn’t a hospital, but it had real facilities that could be used for treating people in disaster scenarios. We had mass casualty drills all the time, so if there was a local incident, we could provide emergency services and care to injured people. I don’t work there anymore, but I believe those drills helped me be able to respond quickly and logically in emergencies (which happens more often than I thought it would now that I have children with a severe lack of self preservation instinct😅).
I work in a job that is (supposed to) involve this. A humorous but informative take seems to really help people retain the information that will ultimately save their life.
Unfortunately, I also work in a place that is conceivably a target for a mass shooting (I'm in the US, and in a historical building associated with education, travel, and Civil Rights) and all training doesn't mean much when you introduce guns into the equation. The best case is that people have time to run or fight back.
"I'm sorry I was mad at you this morning. I didn't mean it...." All of those final text messages are haunting, but that one really got to me.... 😢
After hearing so many accounts on this channel where employees were truly negligent and caused many needless deaths, it was shocking to learn of the penalties the two drivers received for a chain of events that were mostly out of their control. It seemed they were relying on their training (or rather, lack of training); guidance from authority figures not present on the scene; and a chaotic situation that probably didn't provide anywhere near enough time for them to properly assess the situation and make proper decisions. Based only on the information presented in this video, I would not have thought prison to be an appropriate punishment for the drivers.
It's always the peons that get the slap.
It is definitely a horrific and tragically repeated scenario: higher-ups make the mistakes which lead to or escalate a bad situation, yet those responsible higher-ups manage to shirk the blame to some alternate scapegoat. The blame of the extended loss of lives from the sinking of the USS Indianapolis being put on the ship's captain rather than U.S. naval command who botched the safety of the Indianapolis as well as the search and rescue afterwards is another very notable example of this responsibility-scapegoat-shirking. There definitely needs to be a concerted effort to ensure that in such situations the responsible cannot be permitted to escape justice and those (more or less) innocent do not fall victim to falsified blame. A good start is to always follow the money.
While I can agree that the driver of the first train getting jail time is somewhat bullshit if the metro drivers had no formal safety training and can agree that the higher ups who--of course--seem to have avoided jail definitely deserved more blame, the second driver being jailed is more appropriate just because all of the actions he took were stupid even in a vacuum. He maybe can't be blamed for the master key thing with the doors, though I would think he would know taking it would seal all the doors if they weren't yet opened and thus should have left it instead of properly panicking. But everything else? Between seeing all of the smoke billowing out into the station from the flaming train right next to his and also probably being able to see parts of his own train catching fire, he should have *immediately* let everyone out since basically everyone knows how dangerous fires. Even if the train was fireproof the smoke would just eventually started suffocating everyone anyway, which one has to hope is how everyone in his train died instead of avoidably burning to death due to his sheer idiocy.
I'm honestly surprised he only got 5 years for getting 80 people killed.
@@MusicoftheDamned I would argue that not everyone knows how dangerous fires are. Yes, fire can burn... but translating that mentally and emotionally into taking appropriate action is a different story. Watching TV shows and movies about fires, where the hero escapes with death-defying moves, could lull viewers into thinking they, too, can escape unscathed. But watching UA-cam videos about real fires-- one where a crazy person is trying to light up her car and her house, and onlookers try to intervene, while the viewer is waiting seemingly forever for the fire department to arrive, and meanwhile the entire house is going up in flames, and catching the neighboring houses on fire-- Well, that certainly gives perspective.
I will also mention the Colorado law enforcement officers who seemingly did not know that leaving their patrol car on train tracks, then handcuffing their vic- I mean, suspect, and placing her in said vehicle on the train tracks, and shutting her in, would lead to a bad outcome. Many people just have no understanding of obvious and imminent danger.
Oh, and I'll also mention my neighbors that shoot off illegal skyrockets, which explode over my house and drop bits and pieces of flammable, explosive, and toxic debris all over my house and yard, in summer during a California drought when it's not legal to water your lawn enough to keep it alive, let alone from catching fire. I don't think they really understand what would happen if their house caught fire with their generous stash of incendiary explosives inside. I do, which is why I hose down my yard and house every fourth of July. To heck with water restrictions!
@@EXROBOWIDOW I mean, you can argue that, and I see where you're coming from, especially as someone else who lives in California and thus had and still has to deal with idiots shooting off illegal fireworks multiple times a year every goddamn year, even when it was bone dry. But all those examples really do is highlight what we all already know in that "common sense" isn't actually that common and that *a lot* of people can be *really* fucking dumb, even professionals. Both that George Carlin line about intelligence of "the average person" and that line from the first _Men in Black_ about "A person is smart. People being dumb, panicky animals and you know it" come to mind here as they often do on this channel and so many others (and, unfortunately, real life).
In fact, American cops are especially a bad counterexample for this since even if you have positive feelings towards them overall, there's at least that one Supreme Court case that literally discourages police departments from hiring officers who are too smart. Even if IQ and IQ tests are largely bullshit with a dark history based in equally bullshit eugenics, that's still *pretty* telling.
Mind you, I *don't* think driver #2 should have gotten life or anything. I also understand that some people freeze up even when they know what to do and especially if they don't. And yet it's still pretty clear that his various actions and mostly inactions are what got almost 80 people avoidably killed, which is why I disagreed with the OP that he's blameless unlike driver #1--who largely is but got almost as mich time--even if the higher ups who got away with it--like they almost always do--are *also* to blame.
I really _hate_ arsonists. I grew up near a national forest, and a lot of the fires started in it were by idiots doing it on purpose.
I’m up there with ya. I’m a fireman. We do our damndest to keep people and property safe, and understandably things happen, and we try to mitigate that, with fire safety education and building codes and inspections. Then you have these (colourful language omitted) running ‘round setting random things on fire for (more colourful language omitted) reasons. Makes our job harder, puts people, property, and us at risk, for no tangible benefit.
And those are just stationary fires. Our area has brush, but not forest fires, so when I see the fires out west, Fort McMurray, California, all that gorgeous forest destroyed (unnecessarily, as opposed to normal cycles), if nothing else, breaks my heart.
@@jaysmith1408 thank you for what you do. The firefighters have saved my neighborhood from destruction many times. I’ve moved to a new state with better forest management protocols, and less degenerates who want to burn things.
Most likely some climate activists.
@@thesebadseedsThat makes no sense if it is the case.
Fires get my anxiety ratcheted way up.
Equestrian Camp during one of the then worst fires. The camp was constantly reeking of smoke and the horses were stressed out.
Lightning bolt hit a dry mountainside, and the rest of the day, smoke was drifting into the amusement park I worked at. We could see the flames on the other side of the ridge.
Summer job. We started with a group question, “What would you grab if you had to evacuate for a wildfire?” From the windows, we could see the mass of smoke of the Indian Gulch Fire. I went over to where we’d placed our bags, picked up two, led my old half-blind dog over, “I grabbed these this morning.” Coworkers were immediately offering me and my dog a place to stay. The fire had suddenly gotten Real.
Being trapped in a burning vehicle is a nightmare of mine, reminds me of the story of those kids in the school bus in the USA which has also been covered on this channel
Horrible way to go.
Are teh windows used in such vehicles actually glass or what? Just wandering if there is a tool you could take with you to smash the windows in case of fire or emergency.
@@chatteyj In every version of train and bus I know in Germany, all windows are glass, but there are emergency hammers in every carriage, very visible to everyone. Some windows have special gaskets and markings where to smash, and a small sign reading "In case of danger, smash the glass.".
@@chatteyjno, it's glass but I think it's laminated and strengthened safety glass. Been on a bus that has a had a rock thrown at it and the window shatters a bit but it stayed in one piece. The windows on our buses have little stickers telling you to strike there with the little hammer attached to the frame to escape.
It's tragic that it took such an enormous disaster to make the Korean Subway network as safe as it is today, but it's good to see how seriously this was taken in the wake of the tragedy. RIP to all 192 victims
That's a trend I notice watching this channel. Most often things don't improve until a tragedy has happened.
It's just a pity that there often has to be a tragedy in a country for improvements to happen. I wish they'd learnt from other countries first.
@@AlanTuringWannabe Humans are only so capable of forward-thinking. "Safety regulations are written in blood" is, more often than not, referencing the fact that we're not particularly good at figuring out what the biggest risks in a given scenario are until they've already happened. In order to learn from your mistakes, you have to make them first.
Safety Legislation is often written in blood.
@@AlanTuringWannabe Because no one wants to put money on preventing something that didn't happen yet.
Anytime Fascinating Horror starts listing what materials a structure is composed of, you know it's gonna be baaad...
Or for that matter, when something/some place is said to be "fireproof"
Absolutely insane. As soon as i heard plastic and vinyl, I knew it was going to be horrendous.
Those text messages really got to me. It's heartbreaking but beautiful, in a way, that they were able to message their loved ones one last time. A total tragedy, but at least their families got, hopefully, a little bit of solace.
Thanks for the video, by the way. You tell all these stories with such pathos and logos, and they're always so compelling.
I am a subway driver in Berlin Germany.
During my training to become a subway driver in 1993, I was taught to immediately drive through the station without instructions if smoke or fire were seen.
This safety behavior is also regularly trained in the simulator.
That's what I would have done, if I were the driver of the second train. If you see fire or a lot of smoke just blast on through the station, and proceed to the next one. If the power is lost, for any reason, while inside the tunnel, open the doors, so everyone can escape the train, and flee down the tunnel.
Kind of strange, the second driver didn't go with instinct, and just leave the station quickly.
I went to Berlin before the pandemic and enjoyed taking the U-Bahn. I used to live in Chicago which has a good L/subway and bus system. I live in Texas now and driving is horrible. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
That's because in korea they always wait for instructions from higher ups instead of using their own brains and avoid horrible incidents :( for ex. see sewol ferry and itaewon at halloween, koreans are too afraid of standing out and make their own decisions because it could fall back on them and their family (which it does because the higher ups are always right and never at fault) :(
After this and Sewol Ferry tragedy, South Koreans now never listen to official announcements tellling them to stay put, and just high tail it when something feels about to go wrong. On one occasion people just opened up the doors and ran to the next stations through the tunnel.
Oh, that's not going to end badly at all! /s
@@stormisuedonym4599but it is also quite a reasonable response. If authority figures telling people to stay put caused more deaths than people not staying put, then it is probably much better to not listen to similar authority figures telling you to stay put in case of emergencies.
Sure, situational awareness is always necessary, it matters in what way you don't stay put.
@@kumaahito3927 It's reasonable if you choose to ignore probability, sure.
They listened pretty well during COVID 🤔
@@FungeHuckerdo you not see the difference between a life threatening fire that you can run from and a life threatening disease that spreads through travel?
Please consider doing an episode about the Winecoff Hotel fire in Atlanta Dec 7, 1946.
The owner advertised his hotel as “absolutely fireproof” 119 people lost their lives
The owner himself died in that fire but thought he made the hotel fireproof some of the worst blazes were in places considered fireproof
Did you know 5 years after towering inferno a top floor fire in a 40 story high rise resulted in power to elevators knocked out everyone evacuated by stairs fire chief ordered only top 5 floors evacuated but everybody evacuated saying no towering infernos for them the temperature outside that day was 5 degrees and windy it seems like maybe there should be more movies like that and that will make people more aware of the dangers
OH GOOD CALL!
Yup. I read an article about that case years ago.
As an Atlanta native this would be a great episode
I'm so sick of hearing innocent people have to suffer because someone didn't get the help they needed. "I was mistreated, let's go kill almost 200 people who had nothing to do with it!" but yeah it's also shameful how mental issues are treated around the world too.
Yeah, it's definitely not a black-and-white issue. People 100% deserve access to healthcare (including mental healthcare), but that in NO way excuses anyone from harming others. It's just a shitty situation all the way around.
Just goes to show that if you have someone in your life who is having mental struggles and they make threats, you have to take it seriously.
Yeah... If that had been America, someone probably would have gone up in a high place with a rifle at some public event, or shot up a school. In Korea, some a7sehole sets fire to an Underground train full of people. Someplace else, they'll mow into a crowd of shoppers with a lorry or truck of some sort, or fly an airliner into a mountain, or the sea...
In most places now, you can't buy petrol in just any container, and I'm pretty sure that most places in America, even, you can't just wander into a gunstore and buy a gun without filling out some forms, or at the _very_ least, showing some I/D. Many shopping streets and open~air marketplaces are now protected by bollards and air regulatory agencies have tightened up cockpit manning procedures and mandated psychological check~ups of pilots; and I think that all of these are sensible measures. However, the fact that 'nutters' have found so many ways of making innocent members of the public pay for their grievances and obsessions should be a warning (to gun - control advocates, for example,) that such measures can at best be only an inconvenience to homicidal 'whackjobs' (using the clinically preferred term), or perhaps prevent them from acting on the spur of the moment. You're always going to be faced with the human ingenuity factor (and saving exceptions like Ted 'Unabomber' Kascynski, few of these people turn out to be Einsteins!)
Not to absolve the taxi driver of blame for a second (unless his stroke kinda 'burnt out' his sense of right and wrong, which I sort of doubt), but I have to wonder whether he wasn't correct in saying that he'd been let down by his doctors, and the South Korean mental health system. Indeed, he, himself, seems to have proven his whole point! To quote the Captain from the Paul Newman film, 'Cool Hand Luke', "There are some people you just can't reach..." And it's true that we used to lock up too many people too readily and for far too long in psychiatric facilities -- but letting this guy out when they did seems like one Hell of a goof!
@@richiehoyt8487 yes, there are forms (and ID required) to purchase a firearm required to be filled out. Form 4473. The licensed gun stores turn over these forms to the ATF for record.
@@richiehoyt8487As fucked up as it sounds him taking a rifle to shoot up a Metro would probably kill far less people than the fire he started
Every one of my korean friends know about this fire and told me about it. From the way they describe it, it was a big scnadal and every city in the country revised their security measures after that. It's literally the foundation of how modern fire safety measures in korean underground transport are handled. They seem to have taken the aftermath very seriously.
Though it does feel like the direvers were scapegoats to what was a clear attempt from the local authority to cut corners on their tranport system, in a period of fast growth (which is a typical issue in building management and construction planning during the 90s, apparently).
A special mention for the fact that you pronounced the name "Choi" properly, since it trips a lot of people up (as well as every other korean word in this video that were very decently pronounced).
Thank you for that typo, my aunt and I have now coined the phrase, 'if you think there's about to be a scnadle, skedaddle!'
And yeah, the driver of that first train _absolutely_ got shoved under the train in getting a prison sentence; he had fuckall for training, and was busy evacuating people!
The second train's driver probably also didn't deserve prison, but he probably should've been barred from working in public transport again.
The dispatcher who told him to flee without evacuating his passengers first; _that_ guy needed prison!
@@ShadowDragon8685 Agree completely! To add insult to injury for the first driver, it's absolutely unacceptable that the fire alert system didn't automatically communicate about the fire! Noone in their right mind would waste time telling the central about a fire, when the fire alarm is already blaring.
I know that the fire found its genesis in a completely different set of circumstances, but with an example like King’s Cross; revealing everything that can go wrong with fire in a subway station, it’s a wonder that some of the highly priced lessons learned in London that day, were not heeded worldwide. Particularly in this case, with a subway system having not even yet been constructed, at the time of the disaster at King’s Cross station.
korea simply doesn't have the budget.
That’s too bad. However, in Korea’s defense, the unfortunate reality of the situation, even in well-funded communities and industries, is something that has been dubbed, “a tombstone mentality towards safety”. This refers to an attitude where serious safety improvements or regulations are only implemented after a tragic incident or an appalling loss of life has occurred; a reactive rather than proactive approach to safety, where actions are taken too late, after preventable accidents have already resulted in fatalities.
I have been a longtime watcher of 'Air Crash Investigation' (you can find them all over UA-cam and Dailymotion, sometimes called 'Mayday'), and it’s amazing how many mishaps and catastrophes have been so easily preventable, so many missed opportunities. The crash of the Turkish Airlines flight 981, McDonnell Douglas DC-10 is absolutely one of the most galling. 346 lives lost over an aircraft design flaw, of which McDonnell Douglas knew about even back when jetliner type was going through testing, and then later, one which they had made an agreement with the FAA to fix, after a near disaster over Detroit, with American Airlines flight 96.
It’s a sad state of affairs in transportation, engineering, construction, infrastructure, etc, where coffins being filled is the only thing that lights a fire under their asses.
If you’re at all interested, here’s the UA-cam link to the aforementioned 'Air Crash Investigation'/'Mayday' episode. It’s an extraordinary documentary series, and this was an excellent episode.
m.ua-cam.com/video/s8kqN4rf7Uc/v-deo.html
This was the incident one of the students on the Sewol Ferry was referring to, that they were telling the people to stay put only to have them die. She was so right.
Oh goodness, the last text messages just hit hard... What a terrible incident...
I’ve been on the Korean subway (in 2023, so obviously a long time after this) and it was actually so amazing. It has fast wifi, everything was in Korean and in English, and the chairs are colour-coded for who can sit in them (like disabled, elderly , etc) I was really impressed.
I assume you mean seoul, I've also being on the seoul one and completely agree but having been to deagu recently the safey measures are no where near as good as seoul and quite pitiful in comparision
What's also pleasant is the air-conditioning during the hot and humid summers and gentle heating during the cold winter days! But I heard recently that the Seoul trains are now taking their seats out to accommodate more standing passengers.
I’m an American and lived in Seoul for many years. The Korean subway is exceptional and puts those in the U.S. to shame. I ride the DC Metro now and it’s god awful. The Korean airports put ours to shame also…they are so modern and nice.
And the safety measures?
I’m glad they learned lessons from the tragedy and altered procedures and construction to prevent similar incidents of the unwell or evil people from harming the general population.
"unwell" people 😂😂😂😂
Good job kowtowing to pure evil
There are certainly psychopaths who would do this without any reason, but please don’t stop your thought process with „evil people“. There’s more to it! The taxi driver was in very bad shape mentally. Mental health is a major factor in these kinds of attacks to public people. It’s important to have a proper, and big enough mental health system. And access to it for all people, regardless their social or cultural position.
@@spaltmass Stop infantilizing and enabling the bad behavior of the mentally ill.
Nope. That fire was in 2002, I was in South Korea when it happened. Look up the 2008 Namdaemun fire, where another selfish mentally ill individual caused millions in damage. The difference then was Namdaemun Gate being a historic site that was destroyed, no people were hurt. The Namdaemun Gate is in the middle of a major road in Seoul, there's no way to access it while traffic is moving.
@@stormisuedonym4599this
Like I get the dude was mentally unstable but he still was trying to light up containers of gas on a train
He was evil, just because you’re mentally unstable doesn’t make you not guilty and or evil
Sad that so many lost their lives. Excellent story as always
How horrific... I just can't believe that 2nd train driver abandoning all his passengers like that... Just terrible..😢😢😢
He panicked. There was no need to take the key with him but he likely did this out of muscle memory (it will have been some procedure to take the key out when leaving and handing over to another driver, I’m guessing)
Empathise with the guy a little - he likely never intended to cause the entrapment of passengers or the abandonment of them. He almost certainly didn't realise the doors hadn't opened in time.
In the moment, anxious and in the dark about the situation, he reached out to dispatchers for instructions, likely was not adequately trained for emergencies of this nature, and in following the instructions his first act was to open the doors. This can take a few seconds to begin, but in his mind, hit button, doors open, end of story.
Second, to take the key, almost certainly out of pure habitual instinct coupled with a misunderstanding (his failure to realise that the doors weren't far enough into the sequence to continue opening).
Many people, given the same situation and the same training, would have performed similarly poorly in judgement.
I agree. Shameful cowardice.
@@chocolatefrenzieya You try being in his shoes with no warning of what's to come. Bloody hell, read the replies above.
@@OutbackCatgirl
I guess some ppl are just better in dreadful situations...not this train driver unfortunately... Plenty of vid's of ppl in charge doing their best to save their customers or passengers .. I couldn't sleep at night if I knew my passengers cooked to death... 😢😢
I like the way you tell about the people. Also you always emphasize the positive changes that come from horrible tragedies. I know it doesn’t bring back those lost, but it's good to know that sometimes people actually do learn and improve.
I hope one day you'll cover the Granville Train disaster in Australia. I'd love to get your insight into the circumstances around it and what changed afterwards.
There is an Email address in the video description where you can send him suggestions on which incidents he could cover. He reads and answers those emails.
I was in South Korea last year and was very impressed by the safety information videos on the Seoul underground system. In particular I liked that it wasn’t simply a question of telling people to get out, but showed how to open emergency doors and use fire extinguishers. I had not been aware of the Daegu fire and had wondered if this was an outcome of military enlistment in that any train would be bound to have a good proportion of men who have had military training and would presumably have been trained to deal with emergencies.
Hi, I would highly appreciate if you could make a video about the following disaster. This reminded me of the train disaster in Žasliai, Lithuania on april 4, 1975. I made a video about it but you do a way better job, and I found it to be very deserving to be heard more. It is relatively unknown because of the location. There were 20 fatalities and at least 80 injured, but that number is suspected to be way higher because of the suppression of news by the government at the time. What makes the case even more horrific is the severe nature of many injuries, due to the leaking fuel that burned on the clothes of many passengers.
He has an email in the description. Try emailing him with your suggestion. He was courteous enough to respond to the ones I sent! :)
@@daffers2345 👍done
I would then also like to see a video on the Harmelen train collision, on January 8, 1962, which, to this day, is the deadliest railroad accident in the Netherlands.
Between this, the Sewol Ferry and Flight 123, Asia seems like the worst place to be a victim of an accident. They never seem to care about rescuing survivors
Psychiatric hospitals really don’t do much for its patients, 99% of the time, world wide, they are to contain the patients rather than treat them. They don’t really get help, they’re just dumped there. It’s no surprise this often makes mental patients even more disturbed.
Many people simply can't be helped without the use of medication, and only the very worst patients can be compulsorily given them. You see this all the time in the United States, with thousands of insane people who can't function normally but who refuse to take medication. Many end up permanently homeless.
@@derek96720 There are plenty of patients in psychiatric hospitals who take their medication. What they also need is therapy, and general emotional support and support in building better life experience in general. Just throwing pills at a mentally ill person and expecting things to magically get better doesn’t work, this is what most psychiatric hospitals already do anyway.
@@derek96720There is a movement to bring back state institutions and make it easier to involuntarily commit people. I suspect the effort is an attempt to deal with the unhoused and I’d be lying if I said that it didn’t make me uncomfortable.
A lot of people would benefit from vitamins, if more research would be done despite harmaceutical companies not being able to profit
@@crow-jane It should.
American Soldier here, stationed in Daegu 2015-2016. Rode on that subway many times. In general the train system in South Korea is GREAT, but I guess some lessons are learned the hard way.
Thank you for serving!
@@daffers2345 never even got shot at ;)
Sounds like the control center is largely at fault issuing bad hasty orders.
Too concerned with time, not concerned enough with safety. Driver of the second train reported seeing smoke, Control were aware of a fire. He should've been stopped outside the station and left in the tunnel bore. Furthermore when he saw the extent of the fire he should've omitted his station stop, without instruction or hesitation. It sounds like a lack of experience and training
And the person who started the fire on purpose isn’t?
The control could definitely have done a much better job, and they definitely made things much worse, but let’s not forget this incident started with deliberate arson/terrorism rather than someone’s incompetence (that would be the Sewol Ferry Disaster).
It is possible that he was not told that the train was full of passengers. It was up to the driver to apply the 'get out' instruction to everyone, not just himself.
The death toll in too many accidents in East Asia comes down to people not using their own initiative but deferring to management for instructions. This deferential attitude, an intrinsic part of those societies, can be highly dangerous in these situations.
It seems unwise to rely on instructions from people who are not present.
When the second train arrived, it should have continued on instead of stopping next to the smoking/burning train. This was terrible judgment by the driver of the second train.
Hey Facinating Horror creator, just wanted to say thank you for making such awesome films! I really enjoy them andI have learned so much. Please keep making, I watch at least 1 per day so I’m quickly getting through your catalog 😂 #1 fave channel! ❤️
The earlier gas explosion that claimed 101 lives, including a classroom's worth of middle schoolers might be worth covering too, since it apparently lead to changes in safety protocols for tunnel construction?
"I’m sorry that I was mad at you this morning it wasn’t what i meant honey I love you forever"
"Without oppa you must not skip meals and listen to your parents.. get itㅋㅋ and don’t wait for me I won’t come"
"Oppa is in an emergency I think I need to be away. Don’t wait for me and go back. Alright? I love you"
"Study hard and be a good person. Dad is sorry"
The last message of the victims are heartbreaking caused by one man selfishness
two* you forgot the train driver
Exactly! Imagine getting off- but abandoning all of your passengers?! 😢😢@@johnnysilverhand7274
The train driver wasn’t selfish, he had assumed the doors were open, and was unaware the key removal would close them. He was at worst negligent, and should’ve checked, but the amount of smoke would’ve made hanging around to check harder than it sounds
@@Prohass
Remind me not to trust you if you're in charge!
His passengers welfare meant nothing to him, he should have checked the doors were open... I get it was smokey, and he was probably super scared, but he let over 100 roast alive... Not a stand up thing to do...
@@johnnysilverhand7274Kim Dae Wan is the only one to blame here he's the root caused that perished 190 lives by a failed suicide in all places in public subway that clearly he wants others to drag to his suffering the 2 subway drivers are also victim the 2 caught and overwhelmed in the situation in which that they cannot comprehend and cant think a proper judgement remember their lives are also in danger unfortunately its fatal judgement of the 2 drivers caused by panic
This is the disaster response we all need in every country.
I always appreciate how you not only give excellent descriptions of the events and keep away from the sensationalism, but also remind us about the victims. They were real people, who had families and loves ones, and are not just another set of statistics.
Thank you FH, for your thoroughness and compassion in all your videos. Def an all time fave channel!
I thought I'd bury this in the replies, but...i also suffered intense harm from staff when I was admitted to a psychiatric facility and I'm still dealing with the effects to this day. I might be able to imagine a little bit what that man went through and what it did to his mind at his most vulnerable moments.
I'm grateful to have people around me who care and listen. It's truly horrifying to consider where (or who) I would be without them.
@itsdrgrandpa agreed the mental health system has alot to be desired. Especially the stigma and hatred for certain disorders I've seen a few therapists in a attempt to heal my disorder the down side is if you're not a danger to yourself they go you're fine and toss you back out even if you know you're not. Takes a lot of searching to find one who understands and will help.
Kinda surprising that in such a modern railway so many corners were cut for money at the expense of safety. Great portrayal of the events as always
apparently, from what i watched on a korean show, they mentioned that the material of the trains were flammable due to the government trying to cut cost. they found out about the unbelievable low budget train and iirc the government departments pointing fingers at each other to avoid punishments.
Two days after this fire was The Station fire in Rhode Island which killed 100 people.
As always, an excellent documentary. Keep up the great work!
Another informative video. I like how you always cover the changes or lack of changes that occur from these events.
This was a great video as away FH. However, this is one of my personal terrors. The idea of being trapped in a burning anything scares the crap out of me. I have smoke alarms, fire extinguishers every where in my house including one in my car. I even have a fire ladder in my upstairs bedroom where no one stays.
Those are smart things to do.
Those final texts are chilling and give a personal touch to such a massive tragedy. A reminder for everyone that a new day is not guaranteed to anyone. Makes you wonder what yours might say.
Thanks!
Thank you!
Happy New Year, FH. Always grateful for the uploads. The fire videos always hit a little different. Take care, and here’s to 2mil for 2024! 🎆🥳
Wow. I’ve been watching these videos for a couple of years and this is the first time someone who was directly responsible for losing lives was punished. All the rest are like “despite ignoring all safety regulations the company was fined $1,000” and “although the captain lost hundreds of lives through negligence, he was allowed to retain his license”.
Scapegoating employees who had no training for the situation they found themselves in, and even following direct orders during the situation, doesn't mean 'someone who was directly responsible' was punished.
None of the people who authorised cheap plastic interiors instead of fire-retardant materials were punished. None of the people who skimped on employee training time and costs by not allowing for proper evacuation protocols to be designed and practices was punished.
Instead it was the untrained employees who took the blame for the CEO's who put them in that situation. And those cheapskates who went for profit, those who were responsible for the MEANS with which employees have to ensure the safety of their passengers, were in the clear from any blame.
The drivers made mistakes in the panic of the moment, one doing his best to save people, one following the instructions he was given. Yes, their actions contributed to the death toll, but they were doing the best they could in an emergency, in a panic, with inappropriate training. The people who should have taken RESPONSIBILITY were the people who made decisions to save money, decisions that were NOT in the heat of the moment.
Do you mean the train driver? Or the arsonist?
I have listened to many of these documentaries, and have great appreciation of the background detail work preceding each one. Added to which the measured voice over is meticulous, and is a great relief from many American versions. Thank you for the hard work .
“I’m sorry I was mad at you this morning. I didn’t mean it…” that one hurt the most
The driver leaving the train so they were trapped, ohhh no no no, worst nightmare, absolutely awful. Can't believe the guy who did this survived.
South Korea has a lot of horrible tragedies like this. The Halloween crush was particularly insane. The weirdest thing about that is most people went there to see the western expats just walking around in their costumes. The tiktok, photobrag culture there is seriously potent and toxic and will only get worse. The bigger the crowd the more people flock to whatever is going on just to say they were there.
That's because the government believes that health and safety is a socialist concept. Actually it is, but that doesn't make it invalid. The capitalist mindset us, "they had a choice to use the subway or not", I.e it's always the victim's fault.
The Sampoong Mall Disaster, and of course the SEWOL ferry tragedy. South Korea has a huge history of corruption and cover ups. Its incredible.
6:55
Fires like that are almost impossible to fight once they get big. Mostly because you can only do a little because of the confined space. With a big fire the little you can fight it often isn't enough.
That's why usually fire in tunnels and other sealed off places are addressed much more quickly since you can't escalate your response if the fire does.
Especially because in a tunnel environment (1) smoke fills tunnels until it finds an outlet, which generally immediately provides a stack effect, and (2) the surrounding concrete or rock both reflects heat back into the fire and radiates intense heat for hours after the fire is out.
The fact that there was only 2 days between this and the station nightclub fire. Man, fire is not to be fucked with.
I don't usually cry from these videos but those messages got to me. Especially the one apologizing for an argument
It's because you realize what is really what's most important to you at the end and it's something universal. You think of those you love most and want the best for them.
Thanks for always following through with the impacts that these tragedies had. I appreciate hearing that new safety measures were added to make trains safer.
Fires are now one of my biggest fears. After having a small trash can catch fire at work and filled the entire 30,000 sqft building with smoke, I can imagine how scary and serious a real fire can be. I feel so bad for all these people 😢
This is such a great example of "first story" vs "second story".
First story: man starts fire, drivers don't do what needs to be done to keep passengers safe: drivers get jailtime"
Second story: man starts fire, drivers don't react because they think their trains are fireproof, drivers remove keys because that is how they are trained, now knowing that this stops doors from opening, drivers don't report fires because they think an automatic system would have done this.
Yes, if you want to be a moron then you could say that the driver's actions led to the deaths. I say "moron: quite deliberately because they did not start the fire. They did not design the master key so that it makes the doors impossible to open from the inside. They were justified in thinking there would be a fire alarm system. They are justified in thinking there would be fire-supression in the cabs.
The "first story" tries to blame a person and punish them, because anything that goes wrong is *wrongly* considered to be an intentional act by the guilty party.
The "second story" *rightly* assumes that nobody involved did anything that they did not think to be the right thing to do at the time. The driver who took the key was trained to do so, always. He was not trained to leave the key in place in case of fire, because he would had left the key if he had.
The first story makes people hide their actions for fear of punishment, making the whole system less safe.
The second story brings problems in the system to light and if you DONT punish the people who did what they thought was best in a situation that they had no control over, then they will tell you what's wrong with the system so you can prevent it from happening again.
Punishing people feels good and it needs to be done *when people intentionally do bad things* but if you punish a person for making an honest mistake, all they will do is hide the mistake next time and you will never know that your system has a serious, potentially deadly flaw.
The driver of 1080 and his superiors were charged for trying to cover up his actions as well. They found him at the head office and he and his bosses altered documents.
The driver was used as a scapegoat. The company TOLD HIM to go to the head office and dont say anything.
What a truly horrific tragedy. Peace to the departed and their surviving loved ones.
At the station there is a memorial, along with information about the disaster. They also display many items that were burned during the fire. It breaks my heart every time I see it.
On a side note, Line 3 isn't an underground subway at all, it's a completely above-ground monorail line. I'm not sure if that was in response to the disaster or if that was always the plan, but it's a nice way to see parts of the city.
Thanks again for another fine and respectful documentary.
Hey, congratulations you have over 1 million now
Yay 🎉!
also they made this incident into a movie, an accurate dramatization of the events happening and it is not for the faint of heart.
What's the name of the movie?
Dick move not to name the movie😂
Great vid FH. Thank you for bringing these disasters to light. RIP to the souls lost and condolences to their families.
I admire the way you can present a complex event in a concise way. It's a perfect balance of fact providing and storytelling. Objectivity, but not lacking human warmth. Consistent quality videos. 👍👍
AT 8:58, you can see the facial expressions on 5 of the firefighters. It brought tears to my eyes. How horrific it must have been for those men. They probably won't forget as long as they live...
The South Korea metro is a safe and efficient mode of transportation. I rely on it heavily for the majority of my travels here. They play a lot of fire safety videos on the screens in the train cars, which I can now better understand the reasoning.
Good morning 🌄 and thanks again.😊
I've watched every one of these videos and I've never had to stop so hard to cry as when I saw those text messages.
This story can't help but make me think of the King's Cross fire.
I really hope your channel is watched across the world! I completely understand the saying now "safety rules and regulations are written in blood"
I don't always comment but love your channel and happy new year.
The last text that said "I'm sorry I was mad at you this morning, I didn't mean it..." broke my heart.
The texts sent during the disaster were heartbreaking. It was just another normal day for those civilians, but such a small act can lead up to one of the worst disasters in history.
Here are some texts sent during the disaster
"I slept well. The weather today is clear."
-Sent from soon-to-be wife to soon-to-be husband, 7 minutes before the disaster.
"I'm on the subway right now and I'm almost at the office. I'll prepare delicious dinner for you after work!"
-Sent from wife to husband, 4 minutes before the disaster.
"...I'm passing Jungangno station soon, I'll be here soon so wait a little."
-Sent from junior student to senior student, 3 minutes before the disaster.
___________________
*(Fire breaks out)*
-------------------------------
"Oppa there's a fire! I can't breathe because of all the smoke. The door is locked, I can't leave..."
-Sent from girlfriend to boyfriend, 2 minutes after the disaster.
"Honey, honey! A fire broke out but the door won't open. I can't breathe. Help me please... I love you honey, I want to see my kids..."
-Sent from wife to husband, 8 minutes after the disaster.
"Oppa has some stuff to do so I'll have to go somewhere. Don't wait for me, ok? ily"
-Sent from boyfriend to girlfriend, 19 minutes after the disaster.
"What would do if I suddenly stopped existing tomorrow? Just asking cuz I'm curious lol"
-Sent from older sibling to younger sibling, 21 minutes after the disaster.
"A fire broke out, guess I'll go to heaven before you. Hallelujah...amen."
-Sent from a church deacon to his wife, 29 minutes after the disaster.
"You escaped, right mother? I'm okay so... don't be sorry. I love you."
-Sent from son to his mother, 50 minutes after the disaster. They were together on the subway but they lost each other. The mother managed to survive but unfortunately, her son didn't.
"Hyeonseok... I think it's over for your noona. Please be a good child for mommy and daddy."
-Call between an older sister and her younger brother.
"Sorry, I can't give you the bag and shoes... I wanted to cook tonkatsu for you today... sorry. I love you, daughter."
-Sent from mother to her child.
"I'm sorry for being mad and leaving you this morning. I didn't mean it. I love you forever."
"Even if oppa doesn't exist anymore, eat well and listen to your parents... you understand? Also don't wait for me, I'm not coming."
"I'm getting sick of our relationship lol, we're breaking up lmao"
Gosh, the messages broke my heart. Not sure when I cried the last time, but I did while reading them.
Thanks for including both types of measurements, it makes all the difference ❤
Always so horrifying to hear about how a single person's carelessness can lead to the deaths of so many. We effect each other's lives in more ways than we think, quite literally at times.
New Year, new video from Fascinating Horror. Another great video as always. Please keep it up
I’m glad that a lot of these disasters do have a positive ending. Like how all the protocols were switched and things were done differently to prevent anything like this happening again. But also, it looks like that we need to take a better look at the care we provide our People that are suffering from mental illness. And apparently that is worldwide. Because if the man who actually started, the fire, would have been treated better at the mental hospital that he was at, he would not have had any reason to see revenge. Rest in peace to all those that lost their life in this tragedy.
I wish you’d put these in podcast form so I could listen at work. I enjoy your work
thank you for a great video. I always enjoy your videos
Rapid decline in a human's mental health is especially frightening because we are all susceptible to it no matter how sane you are now. This fact of course doesn't excuse what this man did, it's just a reminder on how seriously we need to take this topic. Having hospitals equipped with a department specifically there to address this problem is a great start but we still have so much to learn about what makes us all tick.
It’s really terrifying and makes me feel ill to think about that there are people who had to die just for the rest of us to learn what to do to prevent such events presented in these videos on this channel from happening again.
So, so tragic. I'm so sorry for everyone, including the man responsible and his family.
This is my wife's hometown, and having been there quite a bit, I don't think they learned much from this. Even newer transportation in SK more resembles Soviet tech than anything many people would consider safe or modern. There are multiple deeper cultural issues at work here.
🤨🙄
soviet??? 😂😂😂
What? Like... buses? We have the same transportation as Seoul lol
I would recommend a warm-hearted dramedy 2009 "Cheer Up, Mr. Lee" with the great Cha Seung-won to get the human story with the Daegu fire backdrop. Both touching and funny, it ties to this tragic event. One of my favorite movies ever. Cha Seung-won's acting as a brain-damaged father of a suck child he "didn't know" is brilliant. Please watch to understand how it all ties together.
Oh my God, “I’m sorry I was mad at you this morning, I didn’t mean it” cuts deeeeeeeeep 😢
Something that many people don't know, liquid gasoline isn't flammable but the vapors are explosively so. If the container hadn't ruptured and allowed vapor to form, the fire most likely would not have started.
This is a takeaway that is important in everyday life, and the reason it's so important to be aware of how flammable gas fumes are when you're fueling your vehicle.
Your documentaries are the best! Thank you!
This is why, in a situation where it seems like your life is in imminent danger, you don't listen to other people, and get out of Dodge! This is definitely not the first time, on this channel alone, I've heard of people being told to stay put, only to pay for that order with their lives. If anything, this has taught me in situations like this, you need to be responsible for your own life and not wait for someone else to make the evacuation decision for you.
Some things are the same no matter where you live. These two train drivers go to jail when they had nothing to do with the problem. One was saving lives and the other was following orders. You notice how those high up in power and actually making the decisions received no jail time or negative consequences. I'm glad that they fixed the subway and made it safer but we all need to start holding those in power accountable.
Yeah that wait here for instructions, stay inside, stay seated stuff happens all over. Grenfell Towers people got that line but they knew they lived in a death trap so lots didn't wait.
Shocking.
I’ve never heard of this tragedy, yet so many lost their lives.
Sometimes even large scale tragedies, such as this, don’t make it into the news headlines in Europe.
That’s sad.
It was made worse by the fact that they were in such a confined space being underground so there was less room to escape then if they had been on an open air platform
This is a rather sad story. If you haven’t done so, you should do the Baku Metro fire of 1995.
Happy New Year!!!!