Death toll mounts amid evacuations at China blast site

Authorities pulled more bodies from a massive blast site in the Chinese port of Tianjin early Sunday, pushing the death toll to 112 as teams scrambled to clear dangerous chemical contamination.

Hundreds of people were injured and 85 firefighters and 10 others are missing since a fire and rapid succession of blasts late Wednesday hit a warehouse for hazardous chemicals in a mostly industrial area of Tianjin, 75 miles east of Beijing.

The new death toll came after rescue teams on Saturday evacuated residents who had taken refuge in a school near the site of two huge explosions, state media said, after a change in wind direction prompted fears that toxic chemical particles could be blown inland.

The evacuation came as a fire broke out again at the site of the two Wednesday explosions, in a warehouse specially designed to store dangerous chemicals, the official Xinhua news agency said.

The disaster has raised questions about whether dangerous chemicals were being stored too close to residential compounds, and whether firefighters may have triggered the blasts, possibly because they were unaware the warehouse contained chemicals combustible on contact with water. The massive explosions Wednesday happened about 40 minutes after reports of a fire at the warehouse and after an initial wave of firefighters arrived and, reportedly, doused some of the area with water.

Evacuees were advised to wear long trousers and face masks as they "evacuated in an orderly fashion", according to a post on the official microblog of the Tianjin branch of the National Health and Family Planning Commission of China. The streets appeared calm.

But not all was clear amid emotional scenes as families of missing fire fighters sought answers about their loves ones and officials tried to keep media cameras away. Gong Jiansheng, a district official, told reporters there had been no evacuation.

A 50-year-old man was rescued 50 meters away from the blast zone, Xinhua said. The man was suffering from a burnt respiratory tract but was in a stable condition after surviving three days in a shipping container, the official China Central Television (CCTV) and Xinhua said.

State media reported that the casualties of the first three squads of firefighters to respond and of a neighborhood police station have not yet been fully determined, suggesting that the death toll could go up further.

As details of the blasts and the rescue efforts surface, members of the public have been raising questions about whether fire commanders had erred in prematurely sending firefighters into a highly dangerous zone and using water to put out flames on the site known to have stored a variety of hazardous chemicals, including sodium cyanide and calcium carbide, which become flammable on contact with water.

Local officials also have been hard-pressed to explain why authorities permitted hazardous goods warehouses so close to residential complexes and critical infrastructure, clearly in violation of the Chinese rule that hazmat storage should be 1,000 yards away from homes and public structures.

Pope Francis, meanwhile, offered his prayers to the victims of the disaster. "I assure my prayers for those who lost their lives and for all those persons tried by this disaster," he said Saturday in remarks to thousands of people gathered in St. Peter's Square.

About 6,300 people have been displaced by the blasts with around 721 injured and 33 in serious condition, Xinhua said.

Industrial accidents are not uncommon in China following three decades of fast growth. A blast at an auto parts factory killed 75 people a year ago.

Wire services