People walk by damaged vehicles and road following a pipeline explosion in Qingdao in east China's Shandong province. Photo / AP
The death toll from two huge blasts caused by a leaked oil from a ruptured pipeline in an eastern Chinese port city has risen to 44 with 166 injured in one the country's worst industrial accidents of the year, authorities said Saturday.
The blasts in Qingdao on Friday ripped slabs
of pavement and online photos showed bodies, overturned vehicles and shattered windows in nearby buildings.
Black smoke rose above gigantic fuel silos and darkened much of the sky.The pipeline owned by China's largest oil refiner, Sinopec, ruptured and leaked for about 15 minutes onto a street and into the sea before it was shut off. Hours later, as workers cleaned up the spill, the oil caught fire and exploded in two locations, the city government said.
The Beijing News cited a resident surnamed Gao, who works in logistics, as saying he was driving past Qingdao's Huangdao district when he felt the force of the blasts, and then realized the ground in front of him had fractured.
The air was pungent, many cars on both sides of the road were overturned and there was dark smoke rising in the distance, he said."It felt like an earthquake, and I was dumbstruck," Gao said, adding that there was chaos on the street as people ran, panicking, in all directions.Authorities ruled out terrorism but the incident remained under investigation, it said.
