The South Korean fighter planes incorrectly fell eight bombs into a civilian district on Thursday and injured 15 people and harmful houses and a church during military exercises in Pocheon.
The fire brigade said in a statement that 15 people were wounded, including two who were seriously injured.
Pocheon is located about 40 kilometers northeast of Seoul near the highly militarized border with North Korea.
“There was a sudden loud roar of a combat aircraft, then an explosion ran out. When I went to the scene, there were about four houses who halved before the damage,” said oh Mounge-Su, a 65-year-old resident.
“Dawn and smoke rose to the sky, water raved from a pipe. People in a vehicle that drove to a construction site were injured -cleaning of them could not even get out of the car. Another was outside the car that looked at his eye.”
South Korea’s Air Force said that eight 225-kilogram MK82 bombs of two KF-16 jets fell outside the shooting range during joint live fires.
“We apologize for the damage caused by the abnormal drop accident, and we wish the injured a quick recovery,” said the Air Force in a statement.
The accident was due to a pilot who entered the wrong coordinates, said a military officer who refused due to the sensitivity of the matter. The official said that the two jets then dropped four bombs, with everyone detonating.
The authorities would expose live-for-fire exercises until a clear understanding of what went wrong, but the incident would not have an impact on starting the monthly South Korean and US military exercises on Monday, said the official.
For years, the residents of the region protested against the disturbance and the potential danger from the nearby training area.
Photos from the scene showed a house that was hollowed out by the impact, broken windows and a church building scattered with ruins.
On the local television surveillance camera film material also caught the moments before the incident, with a pickup driving on a street lined with trees before the area is consumed by a large explosion.
“The unthinkable has happened,” said the mayor of Pocheon City, Baeck Young-Hyeun, who asked the government and the military to take measures to prevent further civilian damage.
The Ministry of Defense used to say on Thursday that South Korea and US forces carried out their first joint live fire exercises in Pocheon, which were associated with annual military exercises that are supposed to begin next week.
The Freedom Shield Joint Drills, which will last from March 10th to 20th, aim to strengthen alliance’s willingness to threats such as North Korea, said the joint chiefs of the Seoul before the accident.
This year’s exercises will “teach from the latest armed conflicts” and the growing partnership of North Korea with Russia, added them.
“Our planners look around the world and identify the trends that change and we see how we can include this in our exercises,” Ryan Donald, spokesman for the United States Forces Korea (USFK), told a media conference on Thursday.
About 70 combined field training units are planned for this year’s exercise, said Lee Sung-Jun, a spokesman for Seouls JCS.
