North Gyeongsang Province wildfire damage doubles to nearly 90,000 hectares
A joint government survey revealed Thursday that the scale of forest damage caused by recent wildfires in North Gyeongsang Province was nearly double the initial estimate released by the Korea Forest Service.
According to the investigation by local governments and related authorities, including the Korea Forest Service, the wildfires that raged from March 21 for nearly 10 days across Uiseong, Andong, Cheongsong, Yeongyang and Yeongdeok in North Gyeongsang province scorched nearly 90,000 hectares — equivalent to nearly 1 1/2 times the size of Seoul and a sharp contrast from the previously announced 45,157 hectares.
The latest figure is four times larger than the 2000 East Coast wildfire damage, previously considered the worst in South Korean history.
It is unusual for the actual damage to significantly exceed the estimated impact area, as the affected area typically refers to the region enclosed by fire lines during suppression operations.
Authorities said they would finalize assessing the damage scale and release an official report in the coming days.
In addition to forest damage, the wildfire's toll on public and private property has been tentatively estimated at 1.13 trillion won ($795 million). The fires caused private property losses of about 509 billion won and public facility damage of roughly 621.6 billion won — with forest-related losses alone accounting for 583.1 billion won, or 94 percent of the public sector damage.
North Gyeongsang Province said the assessments of damage to private property — including homes, crops and livestock — were extended until Thursday for accuracy. Based on these findings, the ministries will discuss the final disaster relief and recovery budget, to be confirmed by the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters by the end of April or early May.
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