Three workers were confirmed dead at a Hyundai car plant on Tuesday, during a vehicle performance test, the South Korean automaker announced.
“Three research workers have died at an Ulsan assembly line,” a Hyundai representative told AFP.
“We are trying to determine the cause of the incident,” the representative said, without giving any further details.
Hyundai’s Ulsan facility is located 370 kilometers (229 miles) South-East of Seoul, and the company has referred to its assembly line as the “world’s largest single automobile plant,” complete with an export shipping dock.
Along with its affiliate Kia, Hyundai is the world’s third-largest automaker, recording more than 4.2 million units in global sales in 2023.
According to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, the incident occurred during a vehicle performance test inside a chamber.
Yonhap suspected that unventilated exhaust gases inside the chamber might have been responsible for the fatal accident.
“The three, two Hyundai researchers and the other affiliated with a subcontractor were found collapsed at a test chamber of the plant where they were conducting a car performance test.
“They were taken to nearby hospitals but were pronounced dead,” it added.
“The victims were presumed to have been suffocated due to toxic gas in the enclosed space, and a police investigation is underway to find the exact cause of the accident.”
One worker died at the same Hyundai Motor factory in Ulsan in 2023 after his head was caught in a heat treatment machine during an inspection, local media reported at the time.
Hyundai was forced to issue an apology and said they would “do our best to come up with follow-up measures” to prevent such incidents.
Hyundai and Kia together account for around 80 percent of all new vehicle sales in the South Korean domestic market, according to 2023 data.
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