Hip-hop club workers pulled survivor from Itaewon crush

The police restrict access to the site of the tragedy in Itaewon, central Seoul, on Monday afternoon. [YONHAP]

A survivor of the Itaewon tragedy was stuck for a full hour under bodies before being rescued, according to an anonymous account of the incident posted on Twitter.

The person was eventually pulled from the crush by workers at a hip-hop club, who desperately and heroically fought to free those trapped and keep them conscious.

“I am a survivor who was rescued after being piled under people,” the survivor wrote on Twitter on Nov. 5.

“I tried to take a deep breath, but this was impossible. I fainted after taking some shallow breaths,” the survivor continued. “Then I woke up after someone sprayed water on me. The workers at the club sprayed water, held people’s hands and shouted for them not to fall asleep. They were so desperate.”

According to the post, the person had been to Itaewon for Halloween in previous years and noticed something different this year, that people were moving up the alleyway next to the Hamilton Hotel on both sides rather just on one side.

“There were many people in previous years as well, but it was just as many as we see in a very crowded and packed subway,” the survivor wrote. “Because people were keeping order relatively well before, I was able to take photos with people in the middle of the road.

"But this year was different.”

The person entered the alley at 9:30 p.m. and said the crush started at 10:03 p.m.

“As soon as I was about to leave the alley, I was pushed by people and lost my friends,” the survivor recalled. “I saw about 10 people entangled and unconscious in the entrance of a basement club afterward, and the workers there were trying so hard to rescue them.”

The survivor was pushed and eventually trapped under others for about an hour, so tightly that it was impossible to reach the phone to call the 119 emergency hotline.

In the tweet, the survivor, who is still hospitalized, expressed concern about the trauma the club workers may experience.

“I feel like they will go through worse trauma than me. I saw other people’s hands and the faces of the workers at that time, but what the workers would have seen would be heads filled from the stairs to the ceiling all trying to reach them,” the survivor wrote.

The Itaewon tragedy claimed 156 lives on the night of Oct. 29, including 26 foreigners, according to the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters, as of Monday morning.

BY JANG GU-SEUL, CHO JUNG-WOO [cho.jungwoo1@joongang.co.kr]