An explosion at a Taiwanese-owned plant in China’s Jiangsu Province has killed seven people, Xinhua news agency reported yesterday, 10 days after a blast at a pesticide plant in the province killed 78 people and triggered a nationwide safety inspection campaign.
Yesterday’s blast involved a container of scrap metal that caught fire in a storage area of Kunshan Han Ding Precision Metal Co Ltd’s (昆山漢鼎精密金屬) metal-molding plant in a bonded area in Kunshan, Xinhua said.
The explosion triggered a fire that spread to a nearby workshop, the city government said on its microblog.
One of the injured was in serious condition, a local government post on social media said.
Photographs taken by Taiwanese in the area showed a dark mushroom cloud over the factory site, reaching hundreds of meters into the air.
Han Ding Precision, which was set up in 2004 as a wholly owned subsidiary of Taoyuan-based Waffer Technology Corp (華孚科技), employs about 2,500 workers.
Waffer manufactures magnesium alloy injection molding products, aluminum alloy die castings, and other components and finished products.
Kunshan, about 70km west of Shanghai, is home to more than 1,000 technology companies and manufacturers, including many Taiwanese firms.
China has clamped down on scrap metal imports as part of an environmental campaign against “foreign garbage,” tightening supply sources for metal producers, as it aims to cut solid waste imports by the end of next year.
Additional reporting by CNA
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