Seoul City Conducts 'Drill Exercise' to Rescue Isolated Citizens from Heavy Rain at Cheonggyecheon

Joint Drill with Jurisdictional Fire Station and 'Cheonggyecheon Citizen Rescue'
Training Simulating Real Situations Such as Access Control, Citizen Evacuation, and Drowning Victim Rescue

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Seoul Metropolitan Government will conduct a “Cheonggyecheon Citizen Rescue Joint Drill” on the 9th at Ogan-su Bridge in Cheonggyecheon, simulating an emergency situation where citizens could be trapped due to localized heavy rainfalls during the summer, responding as if it were a real event.

About 60 personnel, including employees from the Seoul Metropolitan Government and Seoul Facilities Corporation, as well as firefighters from Jongno Fire Station and Jungbu Fire Station, will participate in this drill. Four rescue vehicles and two ambulances will be deployed. The “Cheonggyecheon Citizen Rescue Joint Drill” is a training exercise designed to rescue citizens in dangerous situations that could actually occur in Cheonggyecheon during heavy rainfalls. It has been conducted annually to strengthen on-site response capabilities.

The drill consists of four parts: controlling access to Cheonggyecheon and guiding citizen evacuation, evacuating citizens trapped in the river, rescuing drowning victims, and flood recovery. The exercise will be conducted simultaneously at the situation center and on-site, assuming a sudden heavy rainfall in the Cheonggyecheon watershed.

Meanwhile, the Seoul Facilities Corporation monitors the Cheonggyecheon situation center 24 hours a day in real time to prevent citizen entrapment accidents during sudden heavy rainfalls, and permanently deploys 10 safety personnel on-site to promptly carry out citizen evacuation and access control in emergencies.

Han Yoo-seok, Director of the Water Circulation Safety Bureau of Seoul, said, “Cheonggyecheon has a structure where the sluice gates under the bridges open during rainfall, allowing surrounding stormwater and sewage to flow in, causing the river water level to rise rapidly and frequently flooding the walking paths. When an announcement is made during rainfall, we ask citizens using the Cheonggyecheon walking paths to quickly evacuate outside Cheonggyecheon following the guidance of safety personnel.”

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