Fire at Muhak Girls' High School

[Anchor]

A fire broke out this afternoon (Feb. 15) at the annex building of Muhak Girls' High School in Seongdong-gu, Seoul.

Fortunately, there were no casualties as the school is on spring break, but thick smoke spread around the area, prompting local authorities to send out disaster text messages.

Reporter Park Min-kyung has the story.

[Report]

A bright red flame is blazing from the school building across the road.

[“Oh no, what do we do?”]

Black smoke is rising high into the sky, and countinous loud explosions can be heard.

Around 1:30 PM today (Feb. 15), a fire broke out in the annex building of Muhak Girls' High School in Seongdong-gu, Seoul.

[Shin Yeon-sook/Fire Witness: “The restaurant owner was telling everyone to get out quickly. I was so confused, but I grabbed my coat, phone and bag, and ran out. (The restaurant) is right across from the school.”]

The fire department issued a first-level response, deploying all firefighters from the local fire station to extinguish the fire.

The fire was completely extinguished after about 2 hours and 20 minutes, but some parts of the annex building, which houses the cafeteria, and 11 parked vehicles were burned.

Since the school is on spring break, there were no casualties among students or staff.

However, with the cafeteria facilities burned, Muhak Girls' High School plans to implement mobile meal services for the time being.

Because of the thick smoke that spread around the school during the fire, Seongdong-gu sent out disaster text messages asking residents to close their windows and to detour around the area.

The police stated that they are not yet at a stage to confirm the initial fire location or cause, and they plan to conduct a joint investigation with the fire department on the morning of the day after tomorrow (Feb. 17).

Meanwhile, around 10:15 AM today, a fire broke out on the first floor of a 10-story apartment building in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, and was extinguished in about 25 minutes.

A man in his 70s was taken to the hospital after inhaling smoke, and about ten residents evacuated.

This is KBS News, Park Min-kyung.