U.S. Soldier Mingled Among Civilian Tour Group Before North Korea Dash

A 23-year-old American soldier’s madcap dash toward the North Korean border on Tuesday “shocked” the civilian tour group he’d joined that day, a witness told the Associated Press.

“People couldn’t really quite believe what had happened,” Sarah Leslie said. “Quite a few were really shocked. Once we got on the bus and got out of there we were all kind of staring at each other.”

Travis King was among the 43-person group that had departed Seoul that morning for what is known as the Joint Security Area, a site inside the demilitarized zone, wearing casual clothing that gave no sign he was a member of the military, according to Leslie. A picture released Wednesday shows King wearing a navy shirt and black tour hat–his back to the camera looking towards the border–before he made his move.

King appeared to be traveling alone and largely kept to himself, though Leslie said she noticed he’d bought a DMZ hat from a gift shop.

She snapped the photo that captured King with the group in the zone, shortly before his bolt for the border. Leslie said she didn’t realize it wasn’t “some kind of really stupid prank” until she heard guards shouting “‘get that guy.’”

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A junior enlisted soldier assigned to U.S. Forces Korea, King was preparing to return to the U.S. to face disciplinary action after spending time in a South Korean jail on assault charges. A day before his crossing, he had been escorted to Incheon International Airport by U.S. military handlers. He cleared customs, but never boarded his flight.

It is not clear exactly how he left the airport and embarked on the tour, which he’d booked through a private company called Hana Tours ITC, according to an internal U.S. Army report obtained Wednesday by The Messenger.

The company submitted a list of participants to the United Nations Command, which approved the manifest ahead of the tour, the report states. It is not clear why King, who used his U.S. government identification card to check in, was not flagged.

After King broke away from his tour group, security guards unsuccessfully gave chase. King ran across the border and into Panmungak, a building in North Korea’s symbolic border village, according to the report. He then climbed into a van and was driven away by North Korean authorities.

An official familiar with the matter told The Messenger that the U.S. military was looking into the possibility that North Korea had had advance knowledge of King’s intention to cross the border “willfully and without authorization,” as Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin put it.