Nine dead. Eighty-four in hospital. One person still missing.
Those were the figures Chinese state media gave on January 20, two days after a tank exploded inside a steel plant in Baotou, in Inner Mongolia. The figure that matters is how fast the toll climbed. On Monday, January 19, the Associated Press quoted a Baotou city information office representative saying two people had died and eight were unaccounted for. Later that day state media put the dead at four and the missing at six, according to CCTV. By Tuesday, Xinhua counted nine dead.
The blast hit at about 3 p.m. on Sunday, January 18, at a Baogang United Steel plant. Global Times, citing Xinhua, fixed the time at 3:03 and named the vessel: a 650-cubic-meter sphere holding water and steam, in the steelmaking department. The ground shook around the site and a huge white cloud rose over it. Residents several kilometres away told AFP their homes trembled and windows broke. Social media footage showed collapsed ceilings, rubble, fire engines and a large cylinder of metal lying in the wreckage.
Police moved quickly. Those in charge of the factory were detained, the AP reported. Baogang United Steel is a major state-owned company.
The injured
CCTV said on Monday that five of the hospitalized were in critical condition. The other 79 had lighter injuries, among them head and facial trauma and bruising of the limbs. All were stable, the broadcaster added.
What the plant makes
The site mainly produces rare earth steel, an alloy treated with elements such as lanthanum and cerium so it resists corrosion and wear. It goes into high-speed rail track, wind power equipment and marine engineering gear. Few Chinese mills make it; Ge Xin of Lange Steel’s research center named HBIS Group and Citic Pacific Special Steel Group as the only others, both with smaller output.
Baotou Steel said it had activated an emergency plan and would cooperate with investigators. Some facilities and equipment were damaged, it said, with an impact on related production lines and the losses still being assessed. Ge expected the accident to set off major safety inspections across the industry, which could cut operating rates and lift steel prices briefly. He still saw the property slump and weak exports as the bigger forces on the market this year.
Investors had already reacted. Baotou Steel shares closed 5.2 percent lower on Monday, then ended Tuesday unchanged at CNY2.37 in Shanghai. In the first half of last year the company sold 5.4 million tons of special steel and 1 million tons of rare earth steel, and its revenue fell 11 percent to CNY31.3 billion.
The South China Morning Post noted that authorities have often criticized the safety practices of Baotou Steel Group, the plant’s owner. AFP described industrial accidents as common in China because of lax standards, and recalled the 2015 warehouse blasts in Tianjin that killed more than 170 people and injured 700.
Sources
- Chinese steel factory officials detained after explosion that leaves 2 dead, 8 missing
- Chinese steel factory officials detained after explosion that leaves 4 dead, 6 missing
- China factory explosion death toll rises to 9
- Death Toll From Blast at China's Baotou Steel Plant Rises to Nine, Report Says
- Death toll of Inner Mongolia steel factory blast rises to 9
- Death toll rises to 9 after explosion at north China rare earth steel plant
