Fire Alarm Ignored and Not Immediately Informed

It was revealed on the 23rd that also at the Machine and the Equipment Control Center of the Daegu Subway Corporation at the time of the Daegu Subway Fire, the warning message of ‘fire,’ and the alarm went off with it, but the employees ignored it.

Therefore, the Arson Disaster of the Jungangro Station of the Daegu Subway is being revealed as a man-made disaster that most of the related departments of the Subway Corporation as well as people on duty at the Operating Control Center and the enginemen confronted irresponsibly or immaturely.

The Daegu Police Department, which is investigating this incident, revealed that 3 employees, who were working at the Machine and Equipment Control Center including the Chief of the Machine and Equipment Control Team of the Daegu Subway Corporation, Mr. Lee, judged that although, at 9:53AM on the 18th, the fire alarm went off and character message of ‘Fire’ appeared on the control board, as ‘equipment mal-functioning’ and did not informed the Operating Control Center.

The Police stated that if they had started to put down the fire immediately at that time, they could have stopped the Train 1080, which left the Daegu Station at 9:55:30, which was 2 minutes 30 seconds after the alarm, and headed to Jungangro Station.

The Police went on to say, “It has been confirmed that during the month of last December, there were as many as 96 times of mal-functioning at the Machine and Equipment Control Center including fire alarm,” so it proposed that there might be a serious problem on the fire alarm system.

The Police decided to request arrest warrants against all employees of the Machine and Equipment Control Center in charge of homicide by serious professional negligence after more investigation on their charges. Therefore, the subject people for the first criminal punishment of this incident are predicted to be increased to 10 people.

In the meantime, the National Scientific, Criminal & Investigation Laboratory Multiple Death Management Team (Lee Won-tae, Chief, 50) said during a briefing for the families of the missing people at the basement of the Jungangro Station on the 23rd, “As of this morning, there were around 30 bodies had been exhumed after finishing the exhumation work in the 6th car, which had relatively more death in the Train 1080, half way and arranging the exhumed bones.”

The Chief Lee also said, “At the 5th car, around 30 bodies were exhumed after finishing the work half way, and total of around 10 bodies were exhumed from the 1st car to the 4th car.”

With that, the Police decided to request arrest warrants against Mr. Kim Dae-han (56), who set the fire at the train, in charge of homicide by arson on existing facilities, and against 7 other people such as the two enginemen including the engineman of the Train 1080 Mr. Choi Sang-ryol (39), who drove the train to the fire, 3 employees of the General Control Center, who did not watch the closed circuit TV at the time of incident and poorly managed the early disposition, and a station worker of the Jungangro Station Mr. Lee in charge of homicide by serious professional negligence.

The Police also did a seizure and search for the General Control Center of the Daegu Subway Corporation to secure the recording of the radio communication between the engineman of the Train 1079 and the Control Center at the time of fire. The Police also judged that the interior finishes of the Train 1079 caught on fire easily and increased human casualties; therefore, it was handed the delivery of goods contract and plans of the Daegu Subway Line No.1 and investigating them to find out whether they used inferior materials.

The Police will investigate on the management of the Daegu Subway Corporation and the related departments of the City of Daegu, which is taking responsibility of managing and controlling the Subway Corporation, and if any charge is revealed, it will punish them all.