Tianjin: Police unsure what toxins released in fire

Among the dead were at least a dozen firefighters while around 700 people were injured, including more than 70 seriously hurt.

The exact cause is not yet known but China’s President Xi Jinping has demanded those responsible are “severely handled”.

The warehouse, designed to house risky and toxic chemicals, was storing mainly ammonium nitrate, potassium nitrate and calcium carbide at the time, according to police.

The official Xinhua News agency said one person was rescued from the neighborhood about 7 a.m. on Friday.

The State Council, China’s cabinet, said a nationwide inspection of risky chemicals and explosives would be launched in response to the disaster, along with a crackdown on illegal activities to strengthen industry safety.

“The lessons are extremely profound”, it said. “The specialists have to pass through a decontamination spray after they return from the central area of the explosion site”.

The blast, believed to have involved a shipment of explosives, sent huge fireballs into the air and triggered a blast wave that could be felt miles away, CCTV said.

Hundreds of people were injured and thousands of nearby residents have spent the night in makeshift shelters after their homes were damaged.

Foreign companies were assessing damage to facilities in and around the port, a gateway to northeast China, which accounts for about 40 percent of China’s imported cars, Xinhua reported.

Smoke billows from the site of an explosion that reduced a parking lot filled with new cars to charred remains at a warehouse in northeastern China’s Tianjin municipality, Thursday. Some migrant workers at the port may not be documented. The largest Japanese automaker and the interim second biggest in the world has a factory in Tianjin with its partner, FAW Group and the company recently unveiled the expansion of a new production line at the facility to deliver a production output of 100,000 autos at full throttle. Phone numbers listed on the site were disconnected and an email went unanswered.

The explosions sent shockwaves and flaming debris through a wide area. Windows were shattered for miles around.