3 in hospital after huge explosion at chemical plant
Print Edition
THREE people were injured in a chemical plant blast in southeast China’s Fujian Province at around 7pm yesterday.
They were all being treated in hospital, the provincial bureau of workplace safety said, but officials did not specify the extent of their injuries, Xinhua news agency reported.
The blast at an oil storage facility at Dragon Aromatics happened at a pumping station at the plant in Zhangzhou that produces paraxylene, or PX, a chemical used in the manufacture of polyester fiber and plastics.
Yesterday’s blast at the chemical plant was the second in 20 months at the same facility, according to Xinhua.
It was not immediately known if any of the plant’s production facilities were affected or shut down.
The blast was so severe that windows were broken at a gas station 1 kilometer away.
No one at the gas station was injured, local authorities told Xinhua, but everyone had been evacuated.
Pictures posted online showed flames and fumes rising from the plant, with witnessed reporting that a strong tremor was felt as far as 50 kilometers away from the blast site, Xinhua said.
The Zhangzhou fire department said that 430 firefighters had been sent to the scene.
It added that pictures which were circulating on social media purporting to show dead and injured were fake.
Dragon Aromatics, which is owned by Xianglu Group, a Taiwan-based petrochemical group, is one of the largest independently-run PX producers in China.
The plant is planning to expand production by 40 percent by end of this month to 5.5 million tons a year, an industry source said.
PX plants have been highly controversial in China because residents who live nearby fear pollution from them. Plans to locate such plants have caused huge demonstrations, including last year in the southern Chinese city of Maoming.
China’s environmental minister urged during the country’s annual parliamentary session in March that the construction of PX projects be scientifically determined and that they must pass environmental impact assessments.
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