SEOUL, April 28 -- An underground gas explosion at a subway construction site killed at least 71 people and injured more than 180 people in South Korea's third-largest city during morning rush hours Friday, news reports said. The explosion erupted at about 7:50 a.m. at a busy intersection in Taegu 150 miles (242 km) southeast of Seoul. Many of the victims were school children heading for classes. The Yonhap Television News (YTN), a 24-hour news-only cable TV station, said the death toll had climbed to 71, with 181 injured. Many of the injured are in critical condition and the death toll is expected to rise, it said. President Kim Young-sam ordered government agencies to do everything possible to help the victims and prevent a similar tragedy. Witnesses quoted by the state-run Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) said they saw a huge column of flashes go up at the time of the explosion which cut a big hole in the ground and sent cars plunging and flying. About 1,000 search and rescue workers including public servants, police and Army troops from nearby barracks were digging through debris searching for possible survivors and looking for the bodies of those killed, news reports said. Police suspected gas leaking from an underground fuel gas supply pipe may have been set off by the flames of a welding rod used by a subway construction worker, the reports said, but the exact cause had yet to be determined. YTN said about 30 vehicles including vans and cars were lying on the scene of the explosion smashed like paper boxes.
Nearby houses and buildings suffered shattered windows and damaged roofs, it said. It was the second deadly underground gas explosion in the country in less than six months. On Dec. 7 a massive gas explosion rocked a densely inhabited residential area in western Seoul, killing 12 people and injuring 65 people. The explosion destroyed or damaged 150 houses and smashed 30 cars. A faulty control valve on a fuel gas pipe at an underground gas distribution station caused a gas leak and caused the explosion, a police investigation showed.
