"During Seol Holiday, Beware of Traffic Accidents and House Fires"… Traffic Accidents Increase 1.2 Times Just Before the Holiday

Maintaining Traffic Safety Distance on the Road, Take a Break When Tired While Driving
Do Not Leave While Cooking... Thoroughly Organize and Clean Around the Stove

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The government has urged special caution regarding safety accidents such as traffic accidents and house fires during the Seollal holiday.

According to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety on the 26th, from 2016 to 2020, the number of traffic accidents occurring around the Seollal holiday was on average 734 cases on the day before the holiday began, which is 1.2 times higher than usual (599 cases). During the holiday, although the number of traffic accidents decreased to about 400 cases per day due to increased use of public transportation and more family travel compared to the usual 599 cases, casualties were actually more than 21% higher.

By time of day, the most traffic accidents and casualties occurred around 6 PM on the day before the holiday, and especially the number of casualties per traffic accident was highest around noon on Seollal day. More than half of the traffic accidents during the Seollal holiday were caused by failure to comply with safety obligations such as using a mobile phone while driving or watching DMB (56.0%), followed by signal violations at 12.6% (1,110 cases) and failure to maintain a safe distance at 8.9% (791 cases).

During Seollal, the risk of house fires also increases due to increased use of fire for preparing holiday food. From 2017 to 2021, a total of 598 house fires occurred during the Seollal holiday, resulting in 18 deaths and 49 injuries. On average, about 40 house fires occur daily during the Seollal holiday, which is 33.3% more than usual (30 cases).

One out of every two house fires (55.4%) was caused by carelessness such as leaving fire unattended or while cooking. Electrical factors such as poor contact accounted for 20.1% (120 cases), and mechanical factors such as overheating accounted for 8.5% (51 cases). Among careless fires, unattended fire was the highest at 27.2%, followed by cooking-related fires at 26.0%, and cigarette butt fires at 17.8%. House fires mainly start increasing from 9 AM and occur most frequently at 1 PM and 6 PM, coinciding with meal preparation times.

Accordingly, the Ministry of the Interior and Safety urged people to conduct vehicle inspections including engine and brake systems 2 to 3 days before departing for their hometowns, and to definitely check tire wear and air pressure. They emphasized that if you have even lightly consumed alcohol while meeting relatives or during ancestral rites, you should never drive and must only operate a vehicle after the alcohol has completely worn off. They also advised special caution for black ice caused by frost freezing in road cracks during early morning travel.

To prevent fires, it is important to keep the area around the stove tidy when cooking and never leave the fire unattended even for a short time. When using kitchen electrical appliances, avoid plugging multiple devices into one outlet like an octopus plug as it can cause overheating; use a dedicated outlet instead. Due to the recent dry weather, extra caution is advised to prevent forest fires when visiting mountains for ancestral rites.

Ko Gwang-wan, Director of the Prevention and Safety Policy Division, said, “We hope that this Seollal holiday will be a peaceful and accident-free time by following safety rules more carefully than usual so that the precious time spent with family is not marred by unfortunate accidents.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.