South Korea probes Halloween crowd surge as nation mourns

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korean police are investigating what caused a crowd surge that killed more than 150 people during Halloween festivities in Seoul last weekend in the country’s worst disasters in years, as President Yoon Suk Yeol and other residents paid respects to the dead at temporary mourning sites.

Saturday’s deadly crowd surge happened at a sloped, narrow alley in Seoul’s Itaewon neighborhood, a popular nightlife district, with witnesses and survivors recalling a “hell-like” chaos of people falling on each other “like dominoes." They say the entire Itaewon area was extremely jammed with slow-moving vehicles and partygoers clad in Halloween costumes, making it impossible for rescuers and ambulances to reach the site in time.

Police launched a 561-member task force to delve into details of the stampede, the Interior and Safety Ministry said in a release.

Officers are analyzing footage taken by security cameras in the area at the time of the crush and related video clips posted on social media. They were also interviewing witnesses to find exactly when and where the crowd surge started and how it developed, according to the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency.