Coupang Warehouse Fire: Korea's 2021 Disaster Repeats After 5 Years

A major fire at a Coupang logistics center in Incheon triggered a national fire mobilization order. Five years after Korea's 2021 Icheon disaster, we look at what changed — and what didn't.

What happened

At 6:54 a.m. on July 18, a fire broke out on the sixth floor of Coupang's Fulfillment Center 32 (299,000㎡, 8 stories) in Seongnam-dong, Seohae-gu, Incheon. Flames raced up the exterior wall to the seventh floor, and thick black smoke from burning household goods stacked on rack shelving filled the building, hampering firefighting. About 121 workers noticed the fire early and evacuated on their own, so no civilians were hurt — but a firefighter operating a ladder truck inhaled smoke and was treated with hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

About eight hours in, at 3:15 p.m., fire authorities issued a national fire mobilization order, pulling in personnel and equipment from five regions — Seoul, Gyeonggi, North and South Chungcheong, and Gangwon. The 219 personnel deployed at the order's start grew to 386 the next day, with equipment expanding to 142 units. President Lee Jae-myung ordered an all-out firefighting effort, insisted on strict safety measures for firefighters on scene, and called for a thorough investigation into the cause and an 'effective, comprehensive response plan.'

Why it repeated — a replay of the 2021 Icheon disaster

This scene is not new. On June 17, 2021, a massive fire also broke out at Coupang's Deokpyeong logistics center in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province (127,000㎡, 4 stories above ground, 2 below), taking six days to fully extinguish. Kim Dong-sik, a rescue team leader with Gwangju's 119 rescue unit who led the firefighting effort, died in the line of duty, and damages were estimated at 400–600 billion won. After that disaster, both the government and Coupang vowed it would never happen again. Yet five years later, at a similarly structured rack warehouse, a fire once again forced a national fire mobilization order. Unless we examine what changed and what didn't, that same question mark simply carries over to the next logistics center.

By the numbers

According to statistics compiled by Korea's National Fire Agency, warehouse fires nationwide numbered 7,388 over the five years from 2017 to 2021, causing 287 casualties (61 deaths, 226 injuries) and average annual property damage of 174.8 billion won. The estimated damage from the Icheon fire alone (about 474.3 billion won) exceeds half of that five-year cumulative total. In Gyeonggi Province alone, 81 warehouse fires occurred between 2020 and 2024, with total damages of 586.2 billion won — evidence that large warehouse fires aren't rare exceptions, but an industrial risk that recurs almost every year.

Rules got tougher — so why does the gap remain

After the Icheon disaster, the government did tighten fire-safety standards for warehouses. In August 2021, it announced it would require newly built logistics centers to install high-capacity sprinklers discharging at least 160 liters per minute. Later, the Fire Safety Performance Standard for Warehouse Facilities (NFPC 609) added large warehouses to the scope of performance-based design, raising water-supply requirements for fire pumps and sprinklers and mandating large evacuation signs and guide lines. The catch: every one of these rules applies only going forward, to new construction. Once a law changes, existing large warehouses aren't required to retrofit — so rack warehouses built to the old standard are still operating across the country. A 2022 investigation by one outlet, in fact, found fire-safety equipment deficiencies at multiple early-morning-delivery warehouses inspected after the Icheon fire.

Different perspectives — how far should retrofitting go

The logistics industry argues that retrofitting existing warehouses isn't realistic. Rerouting sprinkler piping and reworking rack structures would mean halting operations for major construction, with the cost and disruption likely passed on to sellers and consumers. Fire-safety experts counter that fire loads have grown far larger than when the old standards were set, so retrofitting should at least be phased in for high-risk warehouses with large floor areas or deep basement levels. The US takes a different approach here: it grades storage goods by flammability and rack structure, then requires sprinklers with discharge rates and response speeds matched to each risk grade. Korea's standard, by contrast, requires a single discharge intensity regardless of what's stored — which fire experts say can end up under-designing for the actual risk.

What's next

Gyeonggi Province already carried out an emergency inspection of 164 large warehouses in its jurisdiction last year, after another warehouse fire — a pattern of ramping up inspections after each incident, then easing off. If President Lee's promised 'effective, comprehensive plan' again stops at tightening standards for new construction, it's hard to rule out another fire of similar scale triggering another national mobilization order down the road. Conversely, if this investigation leads to a phased retrofit standard for older large warehouses, or a risk-graded sprinkler system like the US model, this fire could become the moment that finally closes the regulatory gap. What safety standards govern the giant automated warehouses behind 'Rocket Delivery' is no longer someone else's problem — with logistics centers clustered near residential areas, the fallout from a fire reaches workers and neighbors alike.

This is nuloq's own analysis based on the public reporting and official data listed under Sources, written with the help of AI. It is for information only — not investment, legal, or medical advice — and reflects the situation at the time of writing. We correct the text if errors are found.