Snow on Jiri mountainJ iri mountain is covered with snow in South Gyeongsang Province on Dec. 3, 2023, in this photo provided by the province’s Hamyang county. (Yonhap)
This sounds like a pretty gruesome accident to get hit by the main blade of the helicopter:
A firefighting helicopter on a rescue mission crashed Friday into Mount Jiri in southern South Korea, killing two mountain climbers.
The chopper crashed into the Cheonwangbong Peak of the mountain in Sancheong County, South Gyeongsang Province, around 12:07 p.m., according to the fire authorities.
The crash occurred when the helicopter was flying low while carrying out a hoist rescue of a 65-year-old man who suffered heart failure while climbing.
The man fell down along with the chopper and his wife was struck by the helicopter’s main blade as she assisted the rescue on the mountain.
Snow covered NogodanNogodan Peak in Gurye County, 390 kilometers southeast of Seoul, is covered in snow on Nov. 19, 2019, after the first snowfall this winter. Jirisan National Park service, which provided the photo, said heavy snow started falling around the mountain late the previous day. (PHOTO NOT FOR SALE) (Yonhap)
It is pretty amazing that South Korea only established their first national park 50 years ago and it was the actions of local residents that made it happen:
Left: Woo Du-seong, 65, president of a conservationist association for Mount Jiri. Right: Members of Yeonhaban, a hiking group of residents of Gurye, South Jeolla, gather around. After multiple appeals to the National Assembly, Mount Jiri was designated the first national park of Korea in 1967 due to their efforts. [OH JONG-CHAN, WOO DU-SEONG]No matter where you are in Korea, a mountain is likely to be somewhere in the vicinity. There are over 45 million visits to Korea’s national parks in any given year. Jirisan National Park itself accounts for nearly 3 million visits. However, just 50 years ago, Mount Jiri, the second-tallest mountain in South Korea, was the site of rapacious deforestation and likely would have continued to be without the initiative of one local hiking association.Born around Mount Jiri, 65-year-old Woo Du-seong, the president of a conservationist association for Mount Jiri, spoke on Monday as he recollected the events that took place in his youth. It is now 50 years since Mount Jiri was designated the first national park in Korea on December 1967.
“We collected 100,000 won from 10,000 households paying 10 won each,” said Woo. “In 1963, the money could have bought a house in this neighborhood.”
National parks were nonexistent at the time and the first to embark on conservation originated from the bottom-up by Gurye, South Jeolla, residents, including Woo’s father, Woo Jong-su (now deceased).
“According to residents in the area in the early 1960s, in just Gurye alone there were 250 trucks carrying loads on the streets daily. Portable sawmills with circular saws connected to the top of military-grade truck engines were everywhere in valleys.”
Feeling the hurt more than anyone else were the residents of Gurye who had spent their entire lives under the majesty of Mount Jiri. Among them, members of Yeonhaban, a local recreational hiking club, were especially indignant at the sight of these brazen sawmills. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but today Korea’s National Park system is really impressive with many great trails and facilities that began with the establishment Jirisan National Park fifty years ago.
An elk dashes ahead of a car on a road in Hamyang in South Korea’s southeast province of South Gyeongsang on Jan. 5, 2017, as the amount of roadkill has been increasing, in this photo released by the Hamyang municipality. The road leads to Mount Jiri, South Korea’s second tallest mountain located in the southern region in the country. (Yonhap)
