Explosion near chemical plant in China claims 22 lives

An explosion near a chemical plant in China's northern Hebei province early on Wednesday killed 22 people and injured at least 22 others.

Footage from state broadcaster China Central Television showed row after row of charred tanker trucks with smoke still rising from some of them, hours after the explosion occurred.

The fire engulfed 50 vehicles, the official Xinhua news agency reported, citing government sources.

State media said all fires at the blast site had been extinguished.

An official news release said the blast occurred just after midnight at a loading dock next to the plant operated by the Hebei Shenghua Chemical Industry Co. Ltd.

On its website, Hebei Shenghua described itself as a “backbone enterprise of the city, and for the domestic chlor-alkali industry and one of the Top 500 chemical enterprises in the country.”

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the chlor-alkali electrolysis process is used mainly to manufacture chlorine, along with hydrogen and sodium hydroxide solution.

Chlorine is one of the most commonly produced chemicals, widely used in the textile and paper industries, as well as for general cleaning and disinfecting and as a raw material for synthetic organic chemistry. It is also an essential component of construction materials, solvents, and insecticides.

Zhangjiakou, a city about 156km northwest of Beijing, is set to host the 2022 Winter Olympics alongside the capital Beijing.

The explosion occurred at the entrance of the factory when a vehicle transporting dangerous chemicals blew up, according to The Paper, a news outlet that cited a staffer at the Zhangjiakou City Safety Production Supervision Administration.

"On-site search and rescue work and investigation of the cause of the accident are still underway," the propaganda department said.

Three decades of swift economic growth in China have been marred by incidents ranging from deadly mining disasters to factory fires, but public anger over safety standards has grown.

China has vowed to improve industry standards but environmentalists say they fear oversight weaknesses persist, including an opaque production process for hazardous chemicals.

In August 2015, 165 people were killed after a chemical warehouse explosion in the port city of Tianjin. A government report found the disaster was caused by hazardous materials that had been improperly or illegally stored.