“I Came for My Baby...” A Bolt from the Blue Keeps Families up All Night

Foreigners ask the police to identify missing family and friends at the Soonchunhyang University Seoul Hospital, where the bodies from the Itaewon Halloween crowd crush were laid. Woo Chul-hoon, Senior Reporter

A woman broke down as soon as she entered the funeral hall at Paik Hospital in Uijeongbu-si, Gyeonggi at around 2:50 p.m. October 30. The moment she saw her daughter’s friend, an endless stream of tears flowed as she cried, “This can’t be...” “She won’t answer. There are no wounds. No matter how I pull or rub against her, nothing. Even when I put my face against hers, there’s no answer... How can this be happening to me?” The mother continued to mutter in utter despair. “She even survived a major accident. I had hoped she would hang on and live...” A, a woman in her fifties, who was close friends with the victim, held the mother’s hand and cried, “What do we do?”

The victim of the Halloween crowd crush in Itaewon was a woman in her forties, who ran a restaurant with her parents in Seoul. A said, “I heard that she (the victim) was going to Itaewon, and I called her mother because she didn’t answer the Kakao Talk messages.” She explained, “We were all waiting when we got a call from the Yongsan Police Station saying they found her cell phone at the site of the accident.” That’s when they began inquiring everywhere, from the Yongsan Police Station to the Wonhyoro Multipurpose Gymnasium and the Hannam-dong Community Service Center. In the end, they were notified of the victim’s death.

The bodies of those who fell victim in the Itaewon crowd crush were placed in funeral halls throughout the Seoul metropolitan area, where the bereaved families mourned endlessly.

At Soonchunhyang University Seoul Hospital in Yongsan-gu, where many bodies were temporarily placed in the early hours following the accident, many families looking for missing members came in the early hours of October 30, the day after the accident. B arrived at the hospital at around 2:10 a.m. after receiving a call from his daughter’s friend telling him that she couldn’t get in touch with his daughter after they had gone to Itaewon together. The man said, “I saw them bringing in three bodies. I saw their arms and legs, and they were all women.” Half an hour later, B identified one of the bodies and collapsed to the floor crying.

C, a middle-aged woman, also visited the hospital’s emergency room at 3:40 a.m. She yelled at the police officer controlling the site, “I have to identify a body. Why won’t you let me in (the ER)?” D, a young man, sobbed as he spoke into the phone at 4:20 a.m. “They brought in my sister. Come to the Soonchunhyang University Hospital.”

Friends of foreigners who also took part in the Itaewon Halloween party went to where the bodies were laid and identified the bodies. Nathan, an Australian who was in Itaewon with three of his friends the previous night, said, “I saw an Australian friend, whose birthday is coming up next week, on the ground at the site, but I don’t know where he is now.” An official from the Iranian Embassy in South Korea also came to the Soonchunhyang University Seoul Hospital and identified an Iranian man studying in Korea.

Families of victims whose identities were confirmed by the police were at the Dongguk University Ilsan Hospital, where the greatest number of bodies were laid. Around 12:42 p.m. October 30, a middle-aged woman tearfully said to the hospital staff, “Excuse me, I’m here for my baby.” Some bereaved family members screamed after entering the room where the bodies were laid or just sat on the floor staring into space.

The families angrily complained that the site was never properly controlled despite the massive event. E, a man who lost his 24-year-old daughter, met with the reporter in front of the funeral hall at Paik Hospital in Uijeongbu at around 3:20 p.m. this day and said, “What is so unfortunate is that the Halloween scene was aired in the 8 o’clock news, and it was crowded. It wasn’t a normal crowd. They looked like packed sardines.” He continued and said, “It wasn’t on the news because there had been an accident, but because there was an event going on. Why didn’t they do anything about it?”

His daughter, who started working for a company last year, moved out from her father’s home and moved to her own place in Seoul. Worried, he had called his daughter early this day, but heard a strange voice say, “I found the cell phone on the ground.” E came straight to Seoul and filed a missing person’s report. E’s friend, Gim (59) said, “He was a dad who was like a friend to his daughter.” E said, “That won’t bring her back. If they were going to hold a large event, they should have managed it carefully. It’s so sad. I have nothing more to say.”

A missing person’s center for the Itaewon Halloween crowd crush, which occurred on the night of October 29, was set up at the Hannam-dong Community Service Center in Yongsan-gu, Seoul on October 30. Families file a missing person’s report at the center. Kim Chang-gil

The sound of families mourning also filled the funeral parlor at the Uijeongbu Eulji Medical Center, where five bodies--four women and one man aged 20-40--were temporarily placed. At the Uijeongbu St. Mary’s Hospital funeral hall, hung a board displaying red letters stating that a woman aged 25 and a man aged 27 were “laid to rest” due to the “Itaewon accident.” An official from Seoul City Hall said, “The families want to move to another funeral parlor (near their residence), but they (necessary documents) will be issued tonight or tomorrow at the earliest.”

The situation was no different at the Wonhyoro Multipurpose Gymnasium in Yongsan-gu, where bodies were temporarily placed. Around 5:40 a.m. this day, a woman had to bend down and look between the legs of employees from the gu office to check the body, each time one was brought out of the gymnasium, because entry was restricted. The bodies that were identified were moved to another hospital upon the request of the families. The body of a man in his twenties laid at Seoul St. Mary’s Hospital in Seocho-gu, Seoul was relocated to a funeral hall in Asan-si, Chungcheongnam-do after the request from his family.