KOTI - Korea Transport institute

An earthquake-measuring magnitude 5.4 on the ricter scale struck Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province, Korea on November 15 2017. It is tied with the 2016 Gyeongju earthquake on September 12 2016 as the country's strongest earthquake since earthquake observations began in Korea in 1978. The Pohang earthquake was smaller than the Gyeongju earthquake, but the depth was shallow at 9㎞ and the vibrations experienced by the citizens were similar to those during the Gyeongju earthquake.
According to an initial assessment by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, the earthquake damaged 2,165 private properties, including 1,988 private houses. Of those, 52 homes suffered severe damage and 157 suffered serious damage.
At least 82 people were injured in the earthquake, including 15 people who were hospitalized. About 1,124 people stayed in temporary shelters after they had to leave their home.
Thus, the largest and second largest earthquakes in Korean history since records began in 1978 led to aftershocks for a period of about one year, and experts warned that a major earthquake of approxmiately 7.0 was likely to occur on the Korean Peninsula.
In 2015, the Prime Minister's Office and 17 ministries and agencies, including the National Security Agency, set up a 'Safety Innovation Master Plan', which is a mid- to long-term comprehensive plan for disaster management at a national level.
In addition, the Korean government set up a dedicated organization in the municipality and announced that it will invest 30 trillion won in resources over the next five years to strengthen its capabilities in disaster response.
However, there are still many indications that the Master Plan for Safety Innovation lacks expertise in evacuation measures and relief logistics to protect people and property.

5,532 outdoor earthquake shelters nationwide to be used as temporary shelter for residents at the beginning of the earthquake and 1,536 indoor earthquake-resistant shelters nationwide were announced by the National Security Department in December 2016. However, it was pointed out that there were insufficient considerations in the transport section such as facility standards and functions, as well as location and operation technology in the selection process.
It is also unclear whether an evacuation area has been set taking into account the evacuation distance and evacuation transport means and whether the evacuation site and the supply have been selected with consideration for evacuation accessibility according to evacuation means and road network hierarchy.
In the disaster recovery phase after the evacuation, there are many problems in the relief logistics system that deliver the relief materials including the donations to the victims.
Looking back at the process of delivering donations that were sent to the families of accidents that occurred in Jindo Gymnasium at the time of the Sewol-ho ferry sinking accident in 2014, it is possible to know how sluggish the logistics system of Korea is still.
President Moon Jae-in emphasizes the government's willingness as a disaster management general organization to secure national security, with two tasks (No. 55 - Establishment of a national responsibility system for safety accident prevention and disaster safety management, No. 56 – Establishment of integrated a disaster management system and strengthening capacity for immediate response) related to national security management and the strengthening of disaster management systems among the top 100 national government tasks.
The purpose of this study is to review improvements in the national disaster response system, which is directly related to national security, from the viewpoint of evacuation transport and relief logistics and to analyze the disaster response policy to minimize the loss of life in the case of a major disaster including an earthquake.
In this study, evacuation behavior is analyzed from a transport angle, the evacuation distance is compared with the evacuation characteristics, and the evacuation area is set.
We will analyze the access strategy of evacuation routes according to evacuation and road network hierarchy, and verify the response strategy to the actual application sites (Sejong-si).
In order to support the establishment of a comprehensive and systematic relief logistics strategy at a national level, we identify the location of domestic relief logistics hubs, the management of relief goods, and the status of relief goods management.
From this point of view, we analyze issues related to relief logistics resources, relief logistics systems, related laws and systems related to domestic relief logistics in terms of logistics.
In addition, prioritization of improvement efforts will be identified through a causal map analysis between issues, and suggestions for the improvement of problems will be presented.