A second Australian has died in South Korea from injuries sustained in a horrific crowd crush at Halloween festivities in Seoul.
Justina Cho, 28, spent two weeks in hospital before succumbing to her injuries.
Justina died on Sunday, surrounded by her immediate family who’d flown to her bedside.
Justina’s younger sister, Julia, issued a statement on behalf of her family, saying the social worker had moved to Korea a little more than three months ago to pursue her dream of starting her own fashion label.
“Her life was changed overnight due to an incident that could’ve so easily been prevented,” Julia said.
“Her doctor said it was a miracle that her heartbeat returned once in hospital and that she must have wanted to wait until her family could come see her before she said goodbye forever.”
Julia remembered Justina as a creative person who would always put others first and said she and her friends would continue to honour her memory.
“We know she is so deeply loved by so many people and it shows just how big her heart was,” Justina said, asking for people to respect her family’s privacy.
“She will always be remembered as the loving, caring, wise, creative, expressive, gentle, and free-spirited soul she is.”
At least 156 people died when a huge Halloween party crowd surged into a narrow alley in a nightlife district.
Read Related Also: Knicks have proven in past it may take some time to flip season: ‘Room to grow’
Almost 200 more were injured.
Witnesses said that people fell on each other like dominos, screamed, suffered severe breathing difficulties and lost consciousness while crammed into a sloped, narrow alley.
The pair who died were pictured together in fancy dress on the night with two other friends, including Australian man Nathan Taverniti.
“It was a slow, agonising crush. This crush was not caused by drunk people. It was lack of planning, police force and emergency services,” Taverniti said.
“And nobody was willing to help. I watched as people filmed and sang and laughed while my friends were dying, along with many other people.
“I was there trying to pull people out because there was not enough police officers and nobody was doing anything to make the crowd stop.”
President Yoon Suk Yeol later acknowledged that South Korea lacks studies on crowd management and ordered officials to formulate effective crowd control methods based on high-tech resources such as drones.
Police also said they don’t have guidelines to deal with crowd surges at events that have no official organisers, like the Halloween festivities in Itaewon.
– Reported with AP.
