en
Photo released by Xinhua News Agency, firefighters work at the site of an explosion at a restaurant in Yinchuan, northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Wednesday, June 21, 2023.
07 Jul 2023

National safety campaign launched in China after an explosion killed 31 people in a restaurant

en

Chinese authorities has announced a national safety campaign after a massive explosion at a BBQ restaurant earlier in June. Several other deadly tragedies have also affected China in recent months.

On June 21, the official Xinhua News Agency reported that a gas explosion ripped through a restaurant on a busy street in the city of Yinchuan in  the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, where people had gathered for the Dragon Boat Festival. 

31 people were killed and seven injured in the explosion, involving cooking gas at the BBQ restaurant, as reported by ABC News and other world media. 

 

Exploded when replacing a broken valve

According to the Chinese Xinhua News Agency, employees had noticed the smell of cooking gas about an hour prior to the explosion and had discovered that a gas tank valve was broken. The explosion allegedly occurred while an employee was replacing the valve. 

The Chinese President Xi Jinping demanded urgent medical care for the injured and a safety overhaul after the explosion, Xinhua said. He also called for efforts to quickly determine the cause of the accident and hold responsible people accountable under the law.

 

Other large events in China leading up to the national safety campaign:

The explosion isn´t the first tragedy claiming many lives in recent months:

During China´s May Day holiday, at least nine people were killed in an explosion at a Chinese petrochemical plant. Three others died in a helicopter crash. 

In February, 53 miners were killed during the collapse in an open-pit coal mine in the northern region of Inner Mongolia. 

Four people were legally detained over a fire at an industrial trading company in central China in November that killed 38 people.

The central Chinese government has pledged stronger safety measures since an explosion in 2015 at a chemical warehouse in the northern port city of Tianjin. The 2015 explosion killed 173 people, of which most of them were firefighters and police officers. 

 

Photo Credit: Photo from when firefighters are involved in rescuing people from the second floor of the affected building. Photo released by Xinhua News Agency.