Seven people were killed, three injured and up to 150Â 000 evacuated after large amounts of toxic chlorine gas leaked from a factory in southwest China’s Chongqing municipality on Friday, state media said.
The highly irritating, greenish-yellow gas began leaking from the Tianyuan Chemical Industry Plant in the Jiangbei district in downtown Chongqing on Thursday evening, local workers and the Xinhua news agency said.
Local authorities later began evacuating all residents within a 1km radius of the factory, rousing many from their slumber.
In the Dongfang Jiayuan housing compound alone, 5Â 000 to 6Â 000 people were evacuated, said a property management official at the compound surnamed Lee.
“Around 2am today, all the guards woke up all the residents in this housing compound, and told them to leave,” Lee said. “They were mainly taken to the cafeterias at government offices.”
Tens of thousands of people were evacuated by Friday evening, Xinhua said.
Firefighters estimated at least seven liquefied chlorine gas furnaces, with a load of six tons of chlorine gas each, are letting off toxic fumes.
Inhalation of 2,5mg of chlorine gas is enough to cause death and symptoms of inhalation include bronchial spasm, and respiratory difficulty.
Several explosions were reported, including loud explosions as late as 5.57pm local time, according to Xinhua, which had earlier reported that a large chlorine cooler blew up.
Residents living near the scene, who were temporarily allowed to return to their homes, were evacuated again following the explosions.
More than 600 soldiers were mobilised for rescue work and more than 100 have been sent to the scene to evacuate residents.
About 10 workers from the factory have reported minor respiratory problems but are not in danger, Xinhua quoted Miao Guangkui, head of the rescue team, as saying.
“Most of the people evacuated are family of workers,” a worker said.
It was the third chlorine gas leakage at the plant since last year, another worker at the plant was quoted by Xinhua saying.
Sources said the municipal government had planned to move the chemical plant, which employs about 2Â 000 workers from downtown areas to Wanzhou district, a new city zone located in the Three Gorges Reservoir area.
A diplomatic source in Chongqing said the incident happened close to downtown Chongqing.
Many of the people evacuated will spend the night outdoors downtown, he said.
In the Dongfang Jiayuan compound, only security guards remained, a guard said.
“It’s serious. People’s armed police and police are evacuating people,” the guard said. “Only guards remain in the compound. They’ve given us face masks.”
In December, a massive blast at a company facility near Chongqing city released a cloud of toxic gas that forced the evacuation of 60Â 000 nearby villagers.
A total of 243 people died and thousands more were poisoned, making it China’s worst industrial accident.
The site, owned by PetroChina, was being drilled by a CNPC subsidiary. The chairperson of PetroChina — who is also the president of its parent company China National Petroleum Corporation, China’s largest oil and gas company — has resigned over the incident. — Sapa-AFP