Factory blast death toll rises to 71 as hospitals fight to save injured
Print Edition
THE death toll from an explosion that ripped through a factory in Kunshan in east China’s Jiangsu Province on Saturday has risen to 71, with 186 injured, local government officials said yesterday.
Three bodies had been recovered from the debris during clean-up operations.
The injured are being treated at 15 hospitals in eight cities including Shanghai, Nantong and Suzhou.
The dead and injured were mostly workers in a wheel hub-polishing workshop at a plant owned by Kunshan Zhongrong Metal Products Co Ltd.
The blast ripped through the workshop about 7:30am.
The company makes wheels for American carmakers, including General Motors.
More than 200 workers were at the factory at the time of the blast, China’s most serious industrial disaster since a fire at a poultry plant killed 119 people in June last year.
The cause of the explosion had not yet been officially determined, but the Ministry of Public Security said an initial investigation had indicated it was very likely due to a dust explosion, which is caused when clouds of metal particles flowing in the air meet an open flame.
“Metal particles such as magnesium powder have very good adhesion. They wrapped around people and it would have been hard to get rid of them,” said Liu Wei, deputy head of the Kunshan health bureau.
Liu said a majority of the victims suffered severe and deep burns covering more than 90 percent of their bodies. Many of them had to be given a tracheotomy to help them breathe.
Experts in burn injuries from across the country were sent to Kunshan over the weekend to help treat patients, the local government said.
Zhou Guangfeng, a doctor at Beijing Jishuitan Hospital, said a dust explosion would have caused injuries to the victims’ respiratory systems, making treatment much harder.
By late yesterday, 11 victims — seven women and four men — had been transferred to two Shanghai hospitals with burns affecting from 75 percent to over 95 percent of their bodies.
Ten are being treated at Changhai Hospital and one at Ruijin Hospital.
Qiu Zhitao, an official at Changhai, said the vital signs of all the patients were stable but their lives were still in danger.
The condition of Zhang Huiqin, a 25-year-old woman who suffered burns to 97 percent of her body, was very bad, according to Li Ronggui, her brother-in-law. “The doctors said she is the worst of all,” Li said.
Li said Zhang’s husband was on his way from Yunnan Province to Shanghai by air.
The couple have a 3-year-old son.
The Kunshan government said each hospital where victims were being treated had set up a reception room for families and had arranged food and accommodation for them.
By yesterday, nearly 3,000 people had donated blood to help the victims, the local government said.
Meanwhile, operations had been suspended at more than 40 companies using aluminum and magnesium alloy in Kunshan while safety procedures are checked.
Five senior Zhongrong executives have been held for investigation, officials said, without giving details.
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