On the morning of February 18, 2003, commuters making their way through the heart of Daegu, South Korea's third-largest city, boarded subway trains as they would on any ordinary Tuesday. By mid-morning, one of the deadliest urban transit disasters in recorded history had transformed Jungangno station into a scene of horror. The Daegu subway fire would claim 192 lives, injure 151 more, and force a reckoning with the systemic failures that turned a single act of arson into a mass catastrophe.
The man responsible for the fire was Kim Dae-han, a 56-year-old former taxi driver who had suffered a debilitating stroke in November 2001. The stroke left him partially paralyzed, and in the months that followed, Kim grew increasingly bitter about his medical treatment, slipping into a state of depression and violent ideation. He later told investigators that he had wanted to die but was determined not to die alone. He wanted to end his life in a crowded public space. On the morning of February 18, he boarded Line 1 train 1079 heading toward Daegok Station, carrying a duffel bag that contained two green milk cartons filled with a flammable liquid — investigators believed it to be paint thinner or gasoline.
As the train departed Banwoldang station at approximately 9:53 in the morning, Kim began fumbling with the cartons and a cigarette lighter. Other passengers noticed what he was doing and tried to intervene, grabbing at him and attempting to stop him. In the struggle that followed, one of the cartons was knocked over and its contents spilled across the floor of the car. When Kim ignited the lighter, the liquid caught fire immediately. The blaze erupted as the train was pulling into Jungangno station in central Daegu. Kim himself was severely burned — his back and legs caught fire — but he managed to escape the train along with a number of other passengers. Within two minutes of his escape, the fire had engulfed all six cars of train 1079.
The fire spread with terrifying speed because of the materials used in the train's construction. The insulation layered between the aluminum shells of the cars burned aggressively. The vinyl and plastic of the seat cushions and strap handles, along with the heavy plastic matting on the floors, fed the flames and produced dense, toxic black smoke. It was the smoke, even more than the flames themselves, that would kill most of the victims.
The disaster deepened catastrophically when a second train arrived at the station. Train 1080, operated by Choi Sang-yeol, entered Jungangno station and pulled up alongside the already burning train 1079 approximately four minutes after the fire began. Subway officials, seeing the fire on their closed-circuit television monitors, had radioed Choi to proceed with caution. The doors of train 1080 opened briefly, but then closed again — apparently in an effort to prevent the toxic smoke filling the station from entering the cars. Shortly after train 1080 stopped, an automatic fire detector cut power to the entire section, shutting down both trains and preventing train 1080 from leaving.
The operator of train 1079, Choi Jeong-hwan, aged 31, had failed to immediately notify subway officials about the fire when it first broke out, a delay that cost precious minutes. Now, with train 1080 trapped at the station, its operator Choi Sang-yeol made a series of announcements over the intercom advising the 79 passengers aboard to remain seated while he attempted to contact his superiors. Transcripts of the radio communications show that he was eventually told: "Quickly, run somewhere else. Go up... kill the engine and go." Choi opened the doors and fled. But in fleeing, he removed the master key from the ignition. The removal of this key triggered a shutdown of the onboard battery system — the same system that powered the train's doors. With the batteries dead and no electricity from the tracks, the doors of train 1080 locked shut. All 79 passengers still aboard were sealed inside. Every one of them died.
The physical conditions inside Jungangno station made survival almost impossible for those who could not escape immediately. The Daegu subway trains were not equipped with fire extinguishers. The station had no sprinkler system and no emergency lighting. When the power failed, the underground platform was plunged into darkness filled with poisonous smoke. Disoriented commuters stumbled through the blackness trying to find exits, many succumbing to asphyxiation before they could escape. Emergency ventilation systems proved completely inadequate to clear the volume of smoke produced by the burning trains.
More than 1,300 fire and emergency personnel responded to the disaster. The fire itself was extinguished at around 1:38 in the afternoon, but the toxicity of the residual smoke in the station prevented rescue workers from entering for another three and a half hours after the last flames were put out. By the time investigators could work through the site, many of the bodies had been burned beyond recognition — reduced to bone in some cases — requiring DNA analysis to identify victims. A total of 192 deaths were confirmed. Of the bodies recovered, 185 were eventually identified; three additional victims were identified through DNA analysis; one person's remains could not be identified at all.
The Daegu subway fire surpassed the 1982 shooting rampage committed by Woo Bum-kon, who had killed 56 people, to become the deadliest loss of life in a single deliberate act of violence in South Korean peacetime history. The disaster triggered an exhaustive review of subway safety standards across the country. South Korean authorities ordered the replacement of flammable materials in subway cars with fire-resistant alternatives, mandated the installation of sprinkler systems and emergency lighting in underground stations, and revised emergency communication protocols to ensure faster, clearer instructions during crises. The Daegu fire became a defining case study in how a chain of individual failures — inadequate materials, communication delays, and one fateful removal of a key — can transform a single criminal act into a catastrophe of immense proportions.
