Life on the frontline: Fear, camaraderie on South Korean island
When a North Korean artillery shell slammed into his house and burned it to the ground in 2010, Jung Chang-kuan thought that war had broken out again. That attack was a North Korean artillery barrage on Jung’s home, the remote South Korean border island of Yeongpeong, which killed four people in the first such incident since the 1950-53 Korean War.
And on Friday, that previous attack was on Jung’s mind as he fled to a shelter with his family after North Korea fired artillery shells near his island, prompting a South Korean live-fire exercise in response. “There wasn’t that much fear inside the shelter. Rather, all the residents came and it was just a chatting atmosphere because they had not seen each other in a long time,” he said of the Friday evacuation.
In contrast, in 2010, Jung said his family was unable to salvage any of their belongings from their burning house and had no choice but to run. “The shells rained down, smoke billowed, and everything was engulfed in flames and destroyed, there was no time to think about anything else,” he told AFP.
Having to flee again on Friday, 70-year-old Jung said it felt both strange and “reminiscent” of the 2010 incident. But “I wasn’t too shocked,” he said. “I’ve even experienced (my house) being directly hit by artillery fire before.” On Saturday, North Korea fired another 60 artillery shells in the area, Seoul’s military said, urging Pyongyang to immediately cease “actions that increase tension” along the maritime border.
Shelters always open
Yeonpyeong is extremely close — less than two kilometers (1.5 miles) — to the de facto maritime border between the two Koreas known as the Northern Limit Line (NLL). Although it is controlled by Seoul and on the southern side of the de facto maritime border, the sparsely populated island is much closer to North Korea. It is only around 42 kilometers away from the North Korean city of Haeju, while being situated about 115 kilometers west of the South Korean capital Seoul.
On a clear day in autumn months, the train station in Haeju, as well as the plumes of smoke rising from the city’s factories, can be seen from a hilltop on Yeonpyeong. Yeonpyeong operates around 10 shelters across the island equipped with medical beds, children’s books and gas masks, among other materials. “We always keep the shelter doors open,” an official from the Yeonpyeong district office told AFP at one of the shelters where around 200 residents stayed on Friday. “Our aim is to ensure that people can seek refuge here whenever necessary.”