[News Today] HEAVY RAIN HITS SOUTHERN KOREA

[LEAD]
In Gyeongsangnam-do Province, torrential rains have dumped over 500 millimeters in just two days. In Changwon, retaining walls have collapsed, and in Gimhae, UNESCO World Heritage Sites have been damaged. Here's what happened over the weekend.

[REPORT]
A three-meter wall leans precariously toward a residential building.

It couldn't hold on to the silt and bent.

It was temporarily reinforced with steel supports, but fearing further collapse, more than 50 residents were evacuated to the town hall.
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A house in Gimhae was flooded with river water.

A homeowner in her 80s, who narrowly escaped being swept away by a river with the help of a neighbor, still gets chills thinking about it.

Kim Geom-hee/ Gimhae resident
I couldn't do anything once the third wave of water came. I couldn't even go up the mountain.

The upper part of Gimhae's Daeseong-dong Tomb, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is covered with a large tarp.

Record heavy rains had cut a 12-meter-wide by eight-meter-long slope off the western side of the tomb.
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On Saturday, the cities of Changwon and Gimhae each saw record precipitations of 397.7 and 368.7 millimeters, respectively.

Changwon also saw as much as 104.9 millimeters in hourly rainfall.

Kim Byeong-guk/ Busan Regional Meteorological Administration
Record 100mm hourly precipitation was observed in Changwon. Such rainfall is seen about once in 200 years.

The two-day torrential rain caused over one-thousand reports of damage in Gyeongsangnam-do Province alone.

Thirty-two residents were stranded when buildings and homes were submerged in water and roughly 590 hectares of farmland were flooded.

The provincial government began accurate damage assessments and emergency repair works.