Heavy downpours create road closures throughout S. Korea with damages tallying up

2020-08-09 6

올림픽 대로 곳곳 막히고... 남부 폭우로 사흘새 13명 숨지고 2명 실종…3천700명 터전 잃어

Yet again, South Korea's capital has been seeing on-and-off heavy rain throughout the day.
This has caused some major road closures.
Our Kim Do-yeon is on the line with the latest.
Do-yeon, how are the roads at the moment and what's in the forecast weather-wise?
Devin, Seoul is seeing periodic heavy downpours, and the southern part of the country is seeing even more.
In the capital, it's at 10 to 30 millimeters, and it's going to keep raining throughout the night. As a result, some major roads are currently closed.
There are partial closures on the Olympic, Dongbu, and Naebu Expressways and the Northern Gangbyeon Expressways.
The city of Seoul said this is due to the release of an unusual amount backed-up water from the Paldang Dam, so the road closures are likely to continue.
In addition to flooding, the Korea Forest Service has issued warnings and advisories for landslides at 81 locations throughout the country.
They say due to the weakened ground, just a small bit of rain could cause landslides... so people near the mountains will need to take extra caution.
Do-yeon, these landslides and the flooding over the last week have caused a great deal of damage.
What's the latest on that front, and how are the authorities responding?
Devin, that's right, the casualties continue to rise.
There have been thirty deaths in total.
But in just the past three days, rain in the southern part of the country has led to 13 deaths with two people missing.
Nationwide, there are 42 people dead or missing since the first of the month.
The flooding has forced some 6,000 people out of their homes and inundated vast swathes of farmland.
Of the displaced people, around 4,000 are still not able to go back to their homes and are staying with family or at temporary shelters.
Fire departments across the country have saved and evacuated nearly 2,000 people.
As for property damage, the floods have affected more than 9-thousand public and private facilities.
That's all I have for you at the moment.
Back to you, Devin.