Some of the worst rains and floods on record in South Korea this week killed at least 196 people and left 91 missing and feared dead, officials said on Friday.
Record rainfalls in Seoul and northern areas of the country on Wednesday and Thursday killed 130 people and left 62 missing, the defence ministry and the National Disaster Prevention Countermeasures Headquarters (NDPCH) said.
This added to last weekend's misery when floods and mudslides in the south killed 66 people, with 29 missing and feared dead.
Yonhap Television News said 28 bodies were uncovered in a mudslide which buried a motel in Changhung, a popular resort north of Seoul.
Nine soldiers were also killed with another three missing in floods and landslides, the Defence Ministry said.
Officials at the disaster agency said the flooding was some of the worst on record. Preliminary estimates nationwide of the damage from this week's disasters had risen to 278 billion ($213 million), but that figure was sure to mount, they said.
Some 30,000 homes and 500 other buildings were damaged and 22,400 hectares (56,0000 acres) of farmland was submerged in the north. More than 19,000 people were made homeless by flooding and mudslides in the north, the agency said.
Three railway lines and some 50 roads remain closed, it said.
In the town of Dongduchon, less than 10 km (six miles) from the Demilitarised Zone separating the two Koreas, weary residents plodded through knee-deep mud in muggy heat on Friday as they tried to make their homes liveable again.
Alleys in Dongduchon were piled high with people's belongings, some drying out and some irreparably damaged and destined to be discarded.
Kim Jong-gil, 42, was one of many in the town rudely awakened on Thursday morning by the floods.
"All our belongings were swept away...I feel so angry...I don't even know where to begin," Kim said.
Jim Coles, spokesman for U.S. military in Korea, said: "Our two major camps in the (northern) area are completely underwater. Several hundred buildings have water damage to one extent or the other. A lot of roads are blocked."
No U.S. soldiers were killed or injured, he said.
A runway at Seoul's Kimpo International Airport, which was partially closed after a Korean Airlines jumbo skidded off it while landing on Wednesday night, was reopened on Friday.
Ten of the 376 passengers aboard the Boeing 747 flight KE8702 from Tokyo were hospitalised on the anniversary of last year's KAL crash in Guam.
More rain was expected later on Friday, but the national weather office withdrew its heavy rain alert for the northern area of the Korean peninsula.
Weather bureau officials blamed the unseasonal heavy rain -- it should now be the peak of Korea's hot and dry season -- on the "La Nina" weather phenomenon, which is producing unusually wet weather in the Eastern Pacific.
President Kim Dae-jung led a charity collection drive at the presidential Blue House for victims of the floods.
The Han river, which submerged riverside parks and roads on Thursday, had receded to normal levels by Friday.
Mangled cars and heavy debris could be seen in gorges and valleys after the floodwaters receded, while city workers cleared mud and debris from major roads before reopening them to traffic.
Military units were mobilised to search for lost mines and other explosives in the northern regions, a defence ministry official said. Civilians were warned to stay clear of suspicious objects at river-beds.
The rains and floods have compounded gloom in Korea, with unemployment at a record high, companies going bankrupt at the rate of more than 100 a day and the economy expected to shrink by some five percent this year.
($1 = 1,300 won)