Daejeon citizens burst into anger, “I walked to work because there was no snow removal.”

At 9 am on the 7th, the intersection of the Daejeon City Office of Education, Dunsan-dong, Seo-gu, Daejeon City. Vehicles that entered the six-lane road going back and forth in the direction of the Seo-gu Office were crawling. Although the time for work had already passed, the cars slowed down with a turtle step of 20-30 km/h because snow removal was not performed.

A driver who passed this road said, “I am in trouble because the snow that has fallen since yesterday remains on the road,” and “I have been doing this for more than an hour in 20 minutes.” Another driver said, “I couldn’t see the road with snow removal all the way from the apartment to the company,” and said, “What the hell is the mayor of Daejeon do?”

Kim, 50, who goes to work from Galma-dong, Seo-gu, Daejeon to Dunsan-dong, drove to the front door of the apartment around 8 am that day, left the vehicle in the parking lot and walked to work. It was because snow was piled up on the road in front of the main entrance of the apartment. Mr. Kim said, “It was good to go to work on foot.”

Amid a lot of snowfall in the Daejeon area, a cold wave hit, causing great inconvenience to citizens on their way to work. As of 8 am on the 7th, in Daejeon, amid 6.6cm of snow, traffic congestion and vehicle contact accidents occurred one after another in the city. Complaints were poured out that “the local government failed to remove the snow due to a sudden heavy snowfall, and the damage eventually went to the citizens.”

It started snowing in Daejeon at around 9 pm on the 6th, the previous day. Daejeon City said, “From the night before to the morning of the 7th, 382 civil servants and 192 units were put into the snow removal work, and 2000 tons of snow removal agent were sprayed.” On this day, the Daejeon City also released a press release stating that’Daejeon Mayor Heo Tae-jung encouraged workers by visiting the intersection of Gyeongseong Large Village in Seo-gu, Daejeon, where snow removal was being carried out around 5 am on this day.

However, contrary to the explanation of Daejeon City, there was a lot of congestion on the roads in the city that turned into ice. It was because snow removal was not properly performed even though the snow continued to fall from the night before to the morning of the day. An official from Daejeon City said, “I sprayed calcium chloride from 9 pm on the 6th, but the weather was so cold that it did not dissolve well.”

Due to the heavy snowfall, Daejeon City Hall and affiliated government officials delayed their work hours to 10 am by one hour. It was intended to reduce traffic congestion. Daejeon Mayor Hur Tae-jeong said, “Please refrain from driving by car and use public transportation. Please clear the snow in front of my house and store.”

Due to heavy snowfall in Daejeon and Chungnam regions, more than 20 large and small traffic accidents occurred on highways and national highways. At about 7 am that day, a freight vehicle slipped on the snowy road and fell at a 50km point in the direction of Dangjin-Yeongdeok Expressway in Sinpung-myeon, Gongju-si, Chungcheongnam-do. This accident caused the entire area to be extremely congested for over two hours.

At around 3:56 am that day, an accident occurred in Unsan-myeon, Seosan-si, Chungcheongnam-do, where a car slipped by the side of the road and fell into a rice field. Earlier, at 3:14 a.m., a 119 rescue team rescued the driver because a truck got stuck in the snow on Yongwon-ri road in Seongnam-myeon, Cheonan-si. Around 3:2 am, a large freight car slid in the snow on the national highway in Wooseong-myeon, Gongju City, and hit the guardrail.

Daejeon·Hongseong = Reporter Kim Banghyun·Shin Jinho [email protected]