Death Toll Rises As Investigation Into Chinese Port Explosions Continues

But officials said the site had been sealed off and, as far as they knew, any contaminants were contained in that location. Eighteen firefighters remained missing, it said.

A day after the blasts, the Chinese army had deployed 217 military specialists in nuclear and biochemical materials to deal with foul air as the warehouse where blasts took place stored risky chemicals, cyanide and combustible materials.

Along with the 85 killed in the blasts, more than 700 others are still being treated in hospitals, including 25 who are in critical condition and 33 who are in serious condition, according to the news agency.

As for immediate impact on the plastics industry, an analyst from SCI worldwide predicts supply disruptions of propylene, TDI and propylene oxide – a building block for polyurethane, as warehouses in the port now ceased handling of hazardous chemicals, according to an Aastocks.com report.

Gao Huaiyou, the deputy director of the city’s Work Safety Administration, said Friday the warehouse was a temporary storage facility.

But the biggest hazard could be the ignition of residual petrochemicals stored in warehouses close to the site of the explosions.

Leggett said Chinese authorities – unlike their U.S. counterparts – may have lacked thorough documentation of the chemicals moving through the country’s transit facilities, and that the detection of sodium cyanide in a nearby sewer could be concerning.

Other unsafe chemicals stored there likely included potassium nitrate and ammonium nitrate, Xinhua said.

But he said further confirmation is still needed, because the containers were not open, and some even not registered.

What is the environmental toll?

Smoke continued to billow out from the massive pile of hundreds of twisted and damaged containers as well as areas where large quantity of deadly toxic chemicals were piled up for exports before they were caught up in the explosions.

Officials didn’t address the issue directly at the news conference Friday morning.

Firefighters in China are battling to control fires still raging more than 36 hours after two huge explosions killed at least 56 people and devastated a port in the country’s north-east. Some social media posts about the disaster were deleted from platforms in China.

The reports were not yet verified, Gao said.

Fires are still burning at the scene of the explosions and a team of chemical experts has been called in to the site to test for toxic gases.

But Greenpeace warned that the possibility of rain Friday could pose more challenges by setting off reactions and washing chemicals into the ground. A Reuters witness said a fresh blaze ignited cars in a parking lot next to the blast site. As he headed to the spot, young firefighter Liu Shikang sent a message to his friend saying “if I cannot make it, my dad is your dad”.