Trains Skip Itaewon Station as Halloween Crowds Return to Seoul

Photo: *Youngjin, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (file photo, Oct. 29, 2023). The memorial alley in Itaewon, Seoul, at the site of the 2022 Halloween crowd crush; it does not show this year’s crowds.

Subway trains stopped calling at Itaewon Station late on Saturday, Oct. 31, as Halloween crowds packed the Seoul nightlife district where 159 people died in a crowd crush four years ago. Itaewon Halloween night unfolded under heavy controls: the main road was shut to cars, police held people back at alley entrances, and AI cameras tracked crowd density in real time.

Line 6 trains began passing through Itaewon Station without stopping at 11:47 p.m. local time, Yongsan District said in an emergency text alert, according to Yonhap. The district asked people to avoid entering the area and to use nearby Noksapyeong or Hangangjin stations instead. Seoul Metro told broadcaster YTN that trains skipped the station in both directions until service ended for the night and that station entrances were temporarily closed. No serious injuries had been reported in the coverage reviewed for this article as of early Sunday in Seoul.

How big the Itaewon Halloween crowds got

Seoul’s real-time city data put 30,000 to 32,000 people in the Itaewon area at 10 p.m., up from 18,000 to 20,000 at 7 p.m., Yonhap reported. People in their 20s made up 50.6% of the 10 p.m. crowd. The Hongdae district, near Hongik University, drew far more, with an estimated 120,000 to 125,000 people at 10 p.m., and was rated “very crowded.”

Those figures sit below official expectations. Authorities had forecast up to 165,000 visitors in Itaewon and 110,000 in Hongdae, the business outlet Chosunbiz reported before the weekend.

Reporters from The Asia Business Daily described police in fluorescent vests unfolding metal barriers at the entrance of Itaewon’s World Food Culture Street around 10 p.m. and letting people in small groups every three to five minutes. The paper said about 370 officers were assigned to Itaewon alone, and that riot-control buses lined Itaewon-ro while special operations officers patrolled. Some visitors laid flowers for the 2022 victims, Yonhap said.

Seoul’s crowd-safety plan for the weekend

The city designated Oct. 23 through Nov. 1 a Halloween special-measures period, with Oct. 30 to Nov. 1 as the most intensive stretch, according to a Seoul Metropolitan Government release (in Korean). It is managing 14 crowded areas across 10 districts, including Itaewon, Hongdae, Ikseon-dong, Myeong-dong, Seongsu-dong’s cafe street, the Konkuk University food street, Gangnam Station and Apgujeong Rodeo Street.

Of the city’s 1,094 AI crowd-detection cameras, 361 cover those 14 areas. When density reaches the city’s “serious” level of five to six people per square meter, an alert goes automatically to city, district, police and fire control rooms. Drones were assigned to watch Hongdae, Seongsu and Gangnam Station from above, and a disaster command bus was parked at Noksapyeong Plaza in Itaewon for Oct. 31 and Nov. 1.

The city also gave 244 million won in disaster-management funds to seven districts, up from 140 million won last year. Kim Sung-bo, Seoul’s second vice mayor for administration, said that because Halloween falls on a weekend this year and foreign visitor numbers have climbed sharply, “thorough, field-centered advance preparation is needed more than ever” (TBR translation from Korean). The city says more than 10 million foreign tourists visited South Korea from May through September, up 23.2% from a year earlier.

By the numbers: where Seoul put its safety workers

Seoul deployed 3,271 safety workers in total: 2,011 public employees plus 1,200 private safety personnel and volunteers, according to the city release. Itaewon received 1,620 of them, or about half of the total, five times Hongdae’s 326 (TBR calculations). Ikseon-dong got 312 and the Gangnam Station area 204; the remaining 809 went to other managed areas.

The staffing contrasts with where crowds actually gathered. At 10 p.m., Hongdae held roughly four times as many people as Itaewon, yet Itaewon had about five times as many city safety workers (TBR calculations from Seoul city data reported by Yonhap). Seoul’s release did not explain how it set each area’s staffing.

Police and penalties

The National Police Agency said it would deploy about 7,800 personnel nationwide from Friday through Sunday, mainly at 28 key areas including 14 in Seoul, Yonhap reported. Officers were told to split pedestrian flows at bottlenecks, hold back incoming crowds if density rose, and stop and search people carrying replica guns or wearing illegal police-uniform costumes. Dressing as a police officer can bring up to six months in prison or a fine of up to 3 million won, Chosunbiz said. Acting Commissioner Kim Jong-chul inspected Itaewon on Friday and laid flowers at the “Oct. 29 Memorial Alley.”

A joint drug inspection of eight clubs in Seoul’s Gangnam, Seocho and Yongsan districts on Friday night found no violations, police said, according to Yonhap.

Call of Duty maker apologizes over crush footage

The weekend also followed an apology from Activision, the U.S. publisher of Call of Duty. The opening of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, released last week, used real news footage of the 2022 crush, including a paramedic performing CPR, to depict civilian casualties in a fictional North Korean invasion. “We deeply apologize to the victims and their bereaved families who must have suffered, as well as to everyone who we have caused concern,” Activision said in a notice to Korean reporters, Yonhap reported. The company said the clip will be removed in an update on Nov. 12.

Activision told the BBC it had “not intended to reference or trivialise the Itaewon disaster or any other real-world tragedy in any way, shape or form.” The 10.29 Itaewon Disaster Bereaved Families Association welcomed the removal but told the BBC it had not received a direct apology. In a statement, the families said they “cannot help but be appalled” that the scene was used in a game.

Halloween crowds were also managed closely elsewhere this weekend. Tokyo’s Shibuya ward boarded up the Hachiko statue and curbed drinking, and closer to home, Salem published last-train times and crowd rules while Boston opened more than 100 car-free streets for trick-or-treaters.

Sources

• Yonhap News Agency: Up to 125,000 gather in Seoul’s Hongdae area on Halloween; 30,000 in Itaewon
• Yonhap News Agency (Korean): Itaewon Station skipped as Halloween crowds build
• Seoul Metropolitan Government (Korean): Halloween crowd-safety plan for 14 areas
• Yonhap News Agency: Police to deploy 7,800 personnel nationwide for crowd safety during Halloween
• Yonhap News Agency: Call of Duty publisher apologizes for using real footage of Itaewon crowd crush
• BBC News: Footage of Seoul crush to be removed from Call of Duty after backlash

Additional sources

• The Asia Business Daily: Trains skip Itaewon Station as crowds fill alleys
• Chosunbiz: Halloween safety guidelines and visitor forecasts
• YTN (Korean): Itaewon Station skipped overnight because of Halloween crowds
• Yonhap News Agency: No drug-related violations found in special crackdown on eve of Halloween