Image copyright Xinhua Image caption There were 70 workers in the site when the platform collapsed, reports said

At least 67 people were killed when a platform collapsed at a construction site in China's Jiangxi province.

Only two workers were rescued alive and a third was still missing, state television said.

The accident took place at a power plant in Fengcheng where a cooling tower was under construction.

Industrial accidents are common in China, prompting calls for better safety standards. Last year, 170 people died at a chemical blast in Tianjin.

Image copyright Xinhua Image caption Officials have ordered a thorough investigation into the cause of the deadly accident

Image copyright Reuters Image caption Deadly industrial accidents are common in China

Jiangxi province's fire services said some 32 fire trucks and 212 soldiers had been deployed in the rescue efforts.

Photos posted by Chinese media showed iron pipes and concrete slabs lying on the ground inside the large cooling tower.

Recurring tragedy: By Carrie Gracie, BBC China editor

Image copyright AFP

Sensitive to a Chinese public which is increasingly intolerant of lax safety standards, the government sent a senior official from the capital to supervise the investigation, and said those responsible for the disaster would be held accountable.

But the disasters and the government promises now follow a familiar pattern and China's record on industrial safety remains grim. In the first half of the year alone more than 14,000 Chinese workers died in factories, mines and on construction sites.

Even as China grows richer, corner cutting dogs its workplaces. Partly the problem is aggressive competition, partly corruption. But the absence of strong unions to fight for worker protection does not help. Nor a heavily controlled media culture which discourages whistle blowers.

Last year China's president promised his government would learn lessons paid in blood after a chemical blast killed 170 people. But the accidents keep coming and without more independent scrutiny of workplaces, it is hard to see that changing.

According to Jiangxi Daily, two 168m cooling towers were being built at the site as part of a project to add two 1,000-megawatt coal-fired power units to the power plant.

The project will cost 7.67bn yuan ($1.11bn; £890m).

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang ordered an investigation, demanding that those responsible for the accident should be held accountable, Chinese media reported.

It added that the State Administration of Work Safety dispatched a team to investigate the causes of the accident.</s>At least 74 people have been killed after a scaffolding platform collapsed on a Chinese power plant construction site on Thursday morning.

Two injured workers have also been taken to hospital.

The plant's cooling tower was being built in the city of Fengcheng in the country's south-eastern Jiangxi Province.</s>CCTV.com

11-25-2016 10:17 BJT

Authorities confirm that 74 people were killed and two others were injured in an accident at a power plant in China’s eastern Jiangxi province. Search and rescue operations are nearing completion.

Jiangxi construction site collapse death toll rises to 74

The accident took place in the city of Fengcheng early on Thursday morning. More than 60 people were working on a platform and a dozen more were on the ground waiting for their 7 a.m. shifts to begin when the platform of the power plant’s cooling tower, which was still under construction, collapsed.



President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang have urged local authorities to spare no effort in the rescue, treatment and follow-up work.



More than 300 rescuers, two drones and seven cranes are involved in the search for victims. As of 10 p.m. Thursday, 68 victims had been identified.



“When we arrived at the scene, we began using sniffer dogs, drones and life detection instruments to search for workers in the scene, covering 5,000 square meters. The scene is divided into seven areas. Two rescue teams are taking turns to conduct operations in each area,” said Wang Gufeng, Yichun City Fire Detachment, Jiangxi Province.



“Four sniffer dogs are involved in the operation so as to make sure there are no blind spots. As of 8 p.m., the search-and-rescue work has been largely completed.”

Rescuers work at the accident site at the Fengcheng power plant in Yichun City, east China's Jiangxi Province, Nov. 24, 2016.

Meanwhile, the two who were injured were sent to Fengcheng City People’s Hospital Thursday morning and are receiving treatment now. According to the hospital, their injuries are not life-threatening.



The two male injured workers are aged 45 and 59. One has been diagnosed with head trauma, while the other has several contusions.



The hospital sent rescue teams and ambulances to the scene as soon as they received the report. In addition, medical staff have been transferred from surrounding cities to take part in the rescue operation.

Two injured now in stable condition</s>Workers search for survivors in the debris of a collapsed platform in a cooling tower at a power station at Fengcheng, in China's Jiangxi province on Thursday.

More than 200 firefighters and search and rescue dogs were deployed at the site.

Forty people were killed on Thursday when a platform under construction at a power plant collapsed in east China’s Jiangxi province, the latest industrial disaster to hit the world’s second largest economy.

The accident occurred at 7:00 am when a cooling tower platform plunged to the ground, trapping an unknown number of people beneath it, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

Rescuers earlier said that the death toll passed 40, but later corrected it to 40. It is likely to rise as an unknown number of people were still trapped, it said.

Sixty-eight people were working on the platform at the time of the collapse, according to China’s State Administration of Work Safety.

More than 200 firefighters and search and rescue dogs were deployed at the site.

Images from state broadcaster CCTV showed a pile of twisted metal and dozens of rescue workers searching for victims under the rubble.

China has a long history of industrial accidents, from factory explosions to mine collapses and there have been growing demands for more stringent safety standards.

Last year, the Chinese port city of Tianjin was rocked by two massive blasts, killing at least 173 people and injuring hundreds others.

A metal dust explosion at a car parts factory in eastern China in August 2014 killed at least 75 people and injured more than 180.</s>BEIJING — A platform under construction at a power plant in eastern China collapsed early on Thursday, killing 67 people and injuring two, while rescuers pulled one worker from the debris, state media said.

Deadly accidents are relatively common at industrial sites in China, where anger over lax standards is growing. Three decades of swift economic growth have been marred by incidents ranging from mining disasters to factory fires.

Two injured workers were taken to hospital soon after the 7 a.m. local time accident in Fengcheng in Jiangxi province, during work on a cooling tower for the coal-fired power plant.

The company building the plant, Jiangxi Ganneng Co., confirmed the toll of 67 dead. In a stock exchange filing, it said it was cooperating with authorities.

Shares of Jiangxi Ganneng fell 3.7 percent Thursday before trading was suspended. Shares will resume trading Friday, the company said in its statement.

One trapped worker was rescued from the rubble, China News Service reported.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has ordered an investigation, demanding that those responsible for the accident should be held accountable, the central government said.

“Strengthen supervision and preventive measures, prevent such a major accident from happening again,” it cited Li as saying in a statement on its website.

Third-phase construction at the coal-powered Fengcheng plant started earlier this year, state media said.

China has vowed to improve safety at such facilities. President Xi Jinping has said authorities would learn the lessons paid with blood after chemical blasts in the port city of Tianjin killed more than 170 people last year.

Shortly after those explosions, Yang Dongliang was removed from his post as director of the State Administration of Work Safety, and later charged with corruption.

During his trial, which ended Thursday, he admitted to taking bribes and gifts worth $4.12 million, state television reported. He will be sentenced later, it added.

It was not immediately possible to reach Yang’s legal representative for comment.</s>At least 40 people are dead and others are still trapped after a platform collapsed at a power plant's cooling tower in eastern China. Julie Noce reports.</s>At least 67 people were killed when part of a power station under construction in China collapsed Thursday, state media reported, the latest industrial accident in a country with a dismal safety record.

A cooling tower platform plunged to the ground in the early hours, trapping an unknown number of people beneath it, the official Xinhua news agency said.

State broadcaster CCTV put the toll at 67, with local reports saying one person was still missing and two others injured.

Pictures of the scene in Fengcheng, in the central province of Jiangxi, showed a grey mass of concrete slabs, steel girders and twisted metal splayed in a heap on the ground inside a large round structure.

Hard-hatted rescue workers in neon jumpsuits carried bodies out from the site on stretchers wrapped in orange sheeting.

A total of 32 fire engines and 212 military personnel had been deployed to the scene, the Jiangxi provincial fire department said on a verified social media account.

The construction of two 1,000-megawatt coal-fired power units at the Ganneng Fengcheng power station began last July and was expected to be completed by early 2018, the local Yichun city government said on a verified social media account last year.

The expansion was budgeted to cost a total of 7.67 billion yuan (now $1.1 billion), it added.

The main investor for a previous expansion project at the plant suspended trading in its shares on the Shenzhen stock exchange Thursday afternoon, stating that “significant events” that could not be disclosed could impact its share price.

Its shares had fallen 3.41 percent by midday.

Industrial accidents are common in China, where safety standards are often laxly enforced.

In August a pipeline explosion at a coal-fired power plant in the neighbouring province of Hubei killed 21.

Earlier this summer more than 130 people were taken to hospital after chemicals leaked from a plant in eastern China.

In April a chemical fire burned for 16 hours in the coastal province of Jiangsu after an explosion at a facility storing chemicals and fuel, requiring 400 firefighters to quell the flames.

Last December, the collapse of a gypsum mine in the eastern province of Shandong left one person dead and 13 others unaccounted for, with four miners only rescued after being trapped underground for 36 days.

A total of 19 people had been found responsible for the incident, Xinhua said Thursday, with three managers arrested and 16 other local officials “punished”. The agency did not give further details.

The owner of the collapsed mine committed suicide by drowning himself at the scene soon after the collapse, Xinhua said.

He will not be subject to criminal liabilities, it cited investigators as saying.</s>Workers carry a body on a stretcher from the remains of a collapsed platform in a cooling tower at a power station at Fengcheng in China's Jiangxi province on November 24, 2016 (AFP Photo/)

Shanghai (AFP) - Chinese authorities have detained 13 people in connection with a construction collapse at a power station which killed at least 74 people, state media said Friday, the latest industrial accident in the country.

A platform more than 70 metres (230 feet) high in a cooling tower at the Ganneng Fengcheng power station in the eastern province of Jiangxi crashed to the ground early Thursday.

Pictures of the scene showed a grey mass of concrete slabs, steel girders and twisted metal splayed in a heap on the ground inside a large round structure.

Hard-hatted rescue workers in neon jumpsuits carried bodies out from the site on stretchers wrapped in orange sheeting.

Search and rescue efforts were completed on Friday, the official news agency Xinhua said, with 74 people confirmed dead, the youngest of the identified aged 23, and two injured.

Police had detained 13 people involved with the cooling tower project, it added.

On Thursday the vice governor of Jiangxi, Li Yihuang, and two other officials bowed to pay their respects to the victims at a press conference, offering their condolences to the families and saying they felt "very sad" about the accident, footage showed.

Commenters on Chinese social media condemned the latest accident in a country with a dire industrial safety record, demanding that the cause be identified and those responsible punished.

"This is too cruel, devastating 74 families completely with a man-made disaster," said one poster on China's Twitter-like Weibo. "90 percent of them are the pillars of their family."

Another added: "What it revealed is the severe indifference and disrespect to every worker’s dignity and life. Look at these victims and the managers who were in charge of their lives -- can you still sit still?"

Official figures show 66,182 people were killed in workplace accidents in 2015.

The tower, with a design height of 165 metres, was part of a 7.67 billion yuan ($1.1 billion) project to expand the coal-powered electricity generating plant.

Shares in Jiangxi Ganneng, the power station owner, closed down 4.12 percent on the Shenzhen stock exchange on Friday after it said it will "take any measures necessary to reduce the accident’s impact on the firm".

The company had sought to "expedite construction progress" on the expansion project in September, previous statements on its website showed.</s>Sixty-eight victims have been identified. Their ages ranging from 23 to 53, Xinhua reports.

Two other people were injured, including a person whom rescuers managed to pull from under the debris at the site in Fengcheng city in the southern province of Jiangxi, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported.

The platform had been built around a cooling tower that was undergoing repairs, according to state news agency Xinhua.

Sixty-eight people were working on the platform at the time of the collapse, according to China's State Administration of Work Safety.

#UPDATE: Death toll in Jiangxi power plant collapse rises to 40, about 68 people were working at the site at time of accident pic.twitter.com/Dx3jIsLmyl — People's Daily,China (@PDChina) November 24, 2016 More than 200 firefighters were deployed, as well as search and rescue dogs. Images from CCTV showed a pile of twisted metal and dozens of rescue workers searching for victims under the rubble. In a statement, Chinese premier Li Keqiang called for rescue teams to "work around the clock to save people trapped," and to "make every effort to treat the wounded and try their best to reduce casualties."</s>BEIJING: At least 40 people were killed when part of a power station under construction in China collapsed Thursday, the official Xinhua news agency reported, the latest industrial accident in a country with a dismal safety record.

A cooling tower platform plunged to the ground in the early hours, trapping an unknown number of people beneath it, Xinhua said.

Pictures of the scene in Fengcheng, in the central province of Jiangxi, showed a grey mass of concrete slabs, steel girders and twisted metal splayed in a heap on the ground inside a large round structure.

Hard-hatted rescue workers in neon jumpsuits carried bodies out from the site on stretchers wrapped in orange sheeting.

Rescue work was underway, and a total of 32 firetrucks and 212 military personnel had been deployed to the scene, the Jiangxi provincial fire department said on a verified social media account.

Xinhua earlier said more than 40 people had been confirmed dead, before correcting its report to 40, adding: “It is likely to rise as an unknown number of people are still trapped.”

Five injured workers were being treated in hospital, it said.

Around 68 people were on site when the collapse occurred, according to local state media outlet China Jiangxi Online.

The construction of two 1,000-megawatt coal-fired power units at the Ganneng Fengcheng power station began last July and were expected to be completed by early 2018, the local Yichun city government said on a verified social media account last year.

The expansion project cost a total of 7.67 billion yuan (now $1.1 billion), it added.

Industrial accidents are common in China, where safety standards are often laxly enforced.

In August a pipeline explosion at a coal-fired power plant in the neighbouring province of Hubei killed 21.

Earlier this summer more than 130 people were taken to hospital after chemicals leaked from a plant in eastern China.

In April a chemical fire burned for 16 hours in the coastal province of Jiangsu after an explosion at a facility storing chemicals and fuel, requiring 400 firefighters to quell the flames. AFP
At least 74 people are dead and many others injured and trapped after a construction platform at a power plant in the Chinese city of Fengcheng in Jiangxi province collapses.