Blast victims out of danger in Dujiangyan
By Huang Zhiling (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-12-28 06:12

DUJIANGYAN: Two people seriously injured in a gas explosion that killed 44 people in a tunnel construction site in Southwest China's Sichuan Province last Thursday are off the critical list.

Nine other people are still having treatment after receiving less serious injuries in the blast. All are out of danger, said the Sichuan Administration of Work Safety.

The State Council, the country's central government, has set up a work team to find out the cause of the blast and who should be responsible, and to formulate suggestions to prevent similar incidents.

The gas explosion in the tunnel construction site near Dujiangyan on Thursday happened as workers were digging the Dongjiashan Tunnel on the Dujiangyan-Wenchuan Expressway which is under construction.

It is rare to have an explosion in a highway tunnel, said a source from the Sichuan Administration of Work Safety. Dujiangyan, however, abounds in gas and many incidents of gas burning and explosions have taken place in reservoir and tunnel construction sites.

After construction of the Youyi Tunnel of the Zipingpu Irrigation Project started in October 2003, more than 40 incidents of gas burning and explosions have been reported.

(China Daily 12/28/2005 page3)