BEIJING (AP) — The death toll in an explosion at a chemical plant in eastern China has risen to 44, with another 90 people seriously injured, the local government reported Friday.

Thursday's blast at the Tianjiayi Chemical plant in the city of Yancheng is China's worst industrial accident in years. Nearly 1,000 area residents have been moved to safety as of Friday as a precaution against leaks and additional explosions, the city government said in a statement posted to its official microblog.

Windows in buildings as far as about 6 kilometers (3 miles) were blown out by the force of the blast.

The city government statement said 3,500 medical workers at 16 hospitals had been mobilized to treat the injured, dozens of whom remain in critical condition.

The cause of the blast remained under investigation.

China experiences frequent industrial accidents despite orders from the central government to improve safety at factories, power plants and mines.

Among the worst accidents was a massive 2015 explosion at a chemical warehouse in the port city of Tianjin that killed 173 people, most of them firefighters and police officers.

In November, at least 22 people were killed and scores of vehicles destroyed in an explosion outside a chemical plant in the northeastern city of Zhangjiakou, which will host competitions in the 2022 Winter Olympics.</s>BEIJING (AP) — The local government reports the death toll in an explosion at a chemical plant in eastern China has risen to 44, with another 90 people seriously injured.

Thursday's blast at the Tianjiayi Chemical plant in the city of Yancheng is China's worst industrial accident in years, with nearly 1,000 area residents moved to safety as of Friday as a precaution against leaks and additional explosions.

Windows in buildings as far as about 6 kilometers (3 miles) were blown out by the force of the blast.

The Yancheng city government said on its official microblog that 3,500 medical workers at 16 hospitals had been mobilized to treat the injured.

China has long struggled with industrial safety. A 2015 explosion at a chemical warehouse in the city of Tianjin killed 173 people.</s>BEIJING (AP) — A chemical plant explosion Thursday in eastern China has killed six people and left 30 badly injured.

The blast occurred at an industrial park, the city government of Yancheng in Jiangsu province said. A statement on its official social media account said the explosion originated at the Tianjiayi Chemical production facility and its cause was under investigation.

Nearly 400 personnel and 86 fire trucks were dispatched to the scene, the statement said.

A video posted on state broadcaster CCTV's website shows huge plumes of smoke spewing from a factory building and spreading over the area. Windows and garage doors appear to shatter at the moment of the blast.

A man staying at a hotel 5 to 6 kilometers (about 3 miles) from the explosion said by phone that glass in buildings along the entire street shattered, and at least four people in his hotel were wounded.

The man, who asked to be identified only by his surname, Ding, said a student at a nearby elementary school was also hurt.

As of 5 p.m. Thursday, 31 people had been rescued, CCTV reported.</s>The death toll from a huge explosion at a chemical plant in eastern China surged to 44 on Friday, making it one of the country's worst industrial accidents in recent years.

At least 90 other people were seriously injured in Thursday afternoon's blast at the industrial park in Yancheng, said the city government on its official Twitter-like Weibo account after firefighters battled raging fires through the night.

City officials had previously said that at least 12 people were killed and 30 injured in the explosion.

The explosion was so powerful that it apparently triggered a small earthquake, knocked down several factory buildings and shattered the windows of homes a few kilometres away.

Hundreds of rescuers have been dispatched to the scene of the facility run by Tianjiayi Chemical, local authorities said, and more than 3,000 people have been evacuated from the blast site.

Authorities, who are investigating the cause of the accident, said an unspecified number of people were taken into police custody.

The force of the explosion blew out windows and dented metal garage doors of buildings as far as four kilometres (2.5 miles) from the site, said AFP reporters at the scene.

Nearby residents have started sweeping up glass, and in some cases, seemed to have abandoned their homes entirely. Black smoke could still be seen rising from the chemical plant on Friday morning.

Images broadcast on local media showed how the blast toppled factory buildings, trapping workers inside. State broadcaster CCTV showed rescuers pulling a survivor from the wreckage.

Workers covered in blood were seen running out of the factory, said official news agency Xinhua on Thursday, citing witnesses.

An aerial view of the blast area showed a large swath of destruction in the industrial park, where multiple fires had initially raged.

The city government said fires in three chemical tanks and five other blazes in the area were extinguished.

Deadly industrial accidents are common in China, where safety regulations are often poorly enforced.

In November, a gas leak at a plant in the northern Chinese city of Zhangjiakou that will host the 2022 Winter Olympics killed 24 people and injured 21 others.

A report published by local authorities in February revealed that the Chinese chemical firm responsible for the accident had concealed information and misled investigators.

In 2015, China saw one of its worst industrial accidents when giant chemical blasts in the northern port city of Tianjin killed at least 165 people.

The explosions caused more than $1 billion in damage and sparked widespread anger at a perceived lack of transparency over the accident's causes and its environmental impact.</s>BEIJING (AP) — A chemical plant explosion Thursday in eastern China has killed six people and left 30 badly injured.

The blast occurred at an industrial park, the city government of Yancheng in Jiangsu province said. A statement on its official social media account said the explosion originated at the Tianjiayi Chemical production facility and its cause was under investigation.

Nearly 400 personnel and 86 fire trucks were dispatched to the scene, the statement said.

A video posted on state broadcaster CCTV's website shows huge plumes of smoke spewing from a factory building and spreading over the area. Windows and garage doors appear to shatter at the moment of the blast.

A man staying at a hotel 5 to 6 kilometers (about 3 miles) from the explosion said by phone that glass in buildings along the entire street shattered, and at least four people in his hotel were wounded.

The man, who asked to be identified only by his surname, Ding, said a student at a nearby elementary school was also hurt.

As of 5 p.m. Thursday, 31 people had been rescued, CCTV reported.</s>BEIJING (Reuters) - China’s eastern Jiangsu province will launch inspections on chemical producers and warehouses after a deadly blast in the city of Yancheng, according to an emergency notice published by official media on Friday.

An explosion at a pesticide plant in the province has killed 44 people and injured more than 600, the latest in a series of industrial accidents that has angered the Chinese public.

The notice, published on the news website of Jiangsu province’s Communist party, said the government will shut down any chemical firms found not complying with regulations on dangerous chemicals.</s>YANCHENG, China (Reuters) - An explosion at a pesticide plant in eastern China has killed 62 people, state media said late on Friday, with 34 people critically injured and 28 missing, the latest casualties in a series of industrial accidents that has angered the public.

The blast occurred on Thursday at the Chenjiagang Industrial Park in the city of Yancheng, in Jiangsu province, and the fire was finally brought under control at 3 a.m. local time on Friday (1900 GMT), state television said.

Survivors were taken to 16 hospitals with 640 people being treated for injuries, state media had said earlier.

The fire at a plant owned by the Tianjiayi Chemical Company spread to neighboring factories. Children at a nearby kindergarten were also hurt, media said.

The cause of the explosion is being investigated, but the company - which produces more than 30 organic chemical compounds, some highly flammable - has been cited and fined for work safety violations in the past, the China Daily said.

Police, some wearing face masks, sealed off roads to the plant. The blast smashed windows in the village of Wangshang two kilometers (1.2 miles) away, and stunned villagers likened it to an earthquake.

"There was one loud bang followed by a long rumble," one, who gave his family name as Wang, told Reuters. "All the windows were smashed. I went to have a look. Near the site there was blood everywhere. People were crushed."The village stands beside a murky mildewed pond and was built in 2013 for people displaced by the construction of the industrial park where the blast took place. Dozens of Wangshang residents work at the park, and many have not come home.

Many buildings had broken windows and further structural damage, but villagers have not been evacuated. Unlike the police on site, none of them wore masks and had not been advised to.

President Xi Jinping, who is in Italy on a state visit, ordered all-out efforts to care for the injured and to "earnestly maintain social stability", state television said.

Authorities must step up action to prevent such incidents and determine the cause of the blast as quickly as possible, Xi added.

"There has recently been a series of major accidents, and all places and relevant departments must fully learn the lessons from these," the report cited Xi as saying.

The Jiangsu environmental protection bureau said late on Friday that a team of 126 inspectors found various degrees of contamination in local water samples, with nitrobenzene concentrations exceeding standards at one location. Some volatile organic chemical measurements far exceeded surface water standards - 15 times over in one case.

Concentrations of acetone and chloroform outside the blast zone were also within normal limits, it added.

Jiangsu will carry out inspections chemical producers and warehouses, an emergency notice said on Friday.

The notice, published on the news website of the province's Communist Party, said the government would shut down chemical firms found not to be complying with regulations on dangerous chemicals.

Public anger over safety standards has grown in China over industrial accidents, ranging from mining disasters to factory fires, that have marred three decades of swift economic growth.

In 2015, 165 people were killed in explosions at a chemical warehouse in the northern city of Tianjin, one of the world's busiest ports, which is not far from the capital, Beijing.

Those blasts were big enough to be seen by satellites and register on earthquake sensors.

Despite repeated government pledges to tighten safety, disasters have hit chemical plants in particular, with 23 people killed in November in a series of blasts during the delivery of a flammable gas at a chemical maker.</s>BEIJING (AP) - A massive explosion at a chemical plant in eastern China with a long record of safety violations has killed at least 47 people and injured hundreds of others, 90 of them seriously.

Thursday's blast in an industrial park in the city of Yancheng, north of Shanghai, was one of China's worst industrial accidents in recent years. State-run television showed crushed cars, blown-out windows and workers leaving the factory with bloodied heads.

Schools were closed and nearly 1,000 residents were moved to safety as a precaution against leaks and additional explosions, the city government said in a statement posted to its microblog.

The blast created a crater, and more than 900 firefighters were deployed to extinguish the fire that burned into the night.

Windows in buildings as far as 6 kilometers (4 miles) away were blown out by the force of the blast, which caused a magnitude 2.2 seismic shock.

A resident of the community of Chenjiagang, about 5 kilometers (about 3 miles) from the plant, said glass from windows smashed by the force of the blast injured neighbors.

"At the time of the explosion, I was almost deafened and I was terribly frightened," said the woman, who gave only her surname, Zhi.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, on a state visit to Italy, demanded "all-out efforts" to find and rescue victims, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

"Relief work must be well done to maintain social stability. Meanwhile, environmental monitoring and early warning should be strengthened to prevent environmental pollution as well as secondary disasters," it quoted Xi as saying.

Xi said local officials need to learn the lessons of a recent series of industrial accidents to save lives and property, signaling a likely crackdown on safety violations at a time when many Chinese companies are being hit by a downturn in sales that is squeezing profit margins.

The higher death toll, raised from 44 but with no change in the number of injured, suggested rescue crews were still finding bodies at the blast site.

The Yancheng city government statement said 3,500 medical workers at 16 hospitals were mobilized to treat the injured, dozens of whom remained in critical condition.

The U.N. said Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was "deeply saddened" at the loss of life and injuries and sent "heartfelt sympathies" to the families of the victims and to the people and government of China.

The cause of the blast was under investigation, and people responsible for operations at the plant have been placed "under control," Xinhua said. It wasn't clear whether anyone had been formally arrested.

State media said the State Council, China's Cabinet, had been ordered to oversee the investigation.

China experiences frequent industrial accidents despite orders from the central government to improve safety at factories, power plants and mines.

Among the worst accidents was a massive 2015 explosion at a chemical warehouse in the port city of Tianjin that killed 173 people, most of them firefighters and police officers. That blast was blamed on illegal construction and unsafe storage of volatile materials.

In November, at least 22 people were killed and scores of vehicles destroyed in an explosion outside a chemical plant in the northeastern city of Zhangjiakou, which will host competitions in the 2022 Winter Olympics.

Thursday's disaster occurred at a factory run by the Jiangsu Tianjiayi Chemical Co. Located among a cluster of chemical factories in Yancheng, it has a dismal safety record: In February 2018, China's State Administration for Work Safety cited 13 types of safety hazards at the company, including mishandling of tanks of toxic benzene, the source of Thursday's explosion.

Those violations came despite the plant having racked up 1.79 million RMB ($267,000) in fines since 2016 for violations of environmental regulations, according to a judgments issued by local county and city environmental protection bureaus. Those included improperly dealing with hazardous waste and evading air pollution supervision.

A 2017 explosion that killed 10 at a nearby plant prompted the State Administration of Work Safety to dispatch inspectors. They discovered over 200 safety hazards at chemical factories in Yancheng and four nearby cities, including 13 at the Tianjiayi plant. Safety hazards cited included leaks and drips, employees who didn't understand safety procedures, and a lack of emergency shut-off valves on tanks carrying flammable chemicals.

In 2014, the company's chairman, Zhang Qinyue, and Wu Guozhong, its former supply chief, were arrested on suspicion of dumping and burying hazardous waste byproducts near a temple and a village landfill, according to a Jiangsu court criminal judgement. They were convicted in 2017 and the company was fined 1 million ($149,000).

Associated Press writers Yanan Wang and Dake Kang contributed to this report.</s>BEIJING (AP) — A chemical plant explosion Thursday in eastern China has killed six people and left 30 badly injured.

The blast occurred at an industrial park, the city government of Yancheng in Jiangsu province said. A statement on its official social media account said the explosion originated at the Tianjiayi Chemical production facility and its cause was under investigation.

Nearly 400 personnel and 86 fire trucks were dispatched to the scene, the statement said.

A video posted on state broadcaster CCTV's website shows huge plumes of smoke spewing from a factory building and spreading over the area. Windows and garage doors appear to shatter at the moment of the blast.

A man staying at a hotel 5 to 6 kilometers (about 3 miles) from the explosion said by phone that glass in buildings along the entire street shattered, and at least four people in his hotel were wounded.

The man, who asked to be identified only by his surname, Ding, said a student at a nearby elementary school was also hurt.

As of 5 p.m. Thursday, 31 people had been rescued, CCTV reported.</s>An explosion at a pesticide plant in eastern China has killed 47 people and injured more than 600, state media said on Friday, the latest casualties in a series of industrial accidents that has angered the public.

The blast occurred on Thursday at the Chenjiagang Industrial Park in the city of Yancheng, in Jiangsu province, and the fire was finally brought under control at 3 a.m. on Friday (1900 GMT), state television said.

Survivors were taken to 16 hospitals with 640 people being treated for injuries. Thirty-two of them were critically injured, it said.

The fire at a plant owned by the Tianjiayi Chemical Company spread to neighboring factories. Children at a kindergarten in the vicinity were also injured in the blast, media reported.

The cause of the explosion was under investigation, but the company — which produces more than 30 organic chemical compounds, some of which are highly flammable — has been cited and fined for work safety violations in the past, the China Daily said.

President Xi Jinping, who is in Italy on a state visit, ordered all-out efforts to care for the injured and to “earnestly maintain social stability,” state television said.

Authorities must step up action to prevent such incidents from happening and find out the cause of the blast as quickly as possible, Xi added.

“There have recently been a series of major accidents, and all places and relevant departments must fully learn the lessons from these,” the report cited Xi as saying.

The Jiangsu environmental protection bureau said in a late Thursday statement the environmental monitoring station in the area had found no abnormal concentrations of toluene, xylene or benzene.

Concentrations of acetone and chloroform outside the perimeter of the explosion zone were also within normal limits, it added.

Jiangsu will launch inspections on chemical producers and warehouses, according to an emergency notice published by official media on Friday.

The notice, published on the news website of Jiangsu province’s Communist Party, said the government would shut down any chemical firms found not complying with regulations on dangerous chemicals.

Public anger over safety standards has grown in China over industrial accidents ranging from mining disasters to factory fires that have marred three decades of swift economic growth.

In 2015, 165 people were killed in a series of explosions at a chemical warehouse in the northern city of Tianjin.

The explosions at Tianjin, one of the world’s busiest ports and not far from the capital, Beijing, were big enough to be seen by satellites and register on earthquake sensors.

Despite repeated pledges by the government to tighten safety, chemical plants in particular have been plagued by disasters.

In November, a series of blasts during the delivery of a flammable gas at a chemical manufacturer killed 23 people.
A fire and explosion at a chemical plant that makes fertilizer in Yancheng, Jiangsu province, China, kills 47 people and injures 640 others.