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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Sunday, January 04, 2004

Negligence blamed for Chongqing gas blowout

As of January 3, donations totaling five million yuan (600,000 US dollars) had been raised by the Red Cross of Chongqing Municipality for gas blowout victims in Kaixian County. The fatal Chongqing gas field blowout was a grave accident caused by negligence.


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As of January 3, donations totaling five million yuan (600,000 US dollars) had been raised bythe Red Cross of Chongqing Municipality for gas blowout victims in Kaixian County.

Of the total, 2.3 million yuan (277,000 US dollars) was from Jwo Joo Yuen Jin, a Malaysian of Chinese origin, along with the Perfect Commodity Co., Ltd, which he sets up in Zhongshan City in southern China's Guangdong Province.

Other donators included the Red Cross of Beijing, the Red Cross of Shanghai and some local institutions.

Negligence blamed for gas blowout
The fatal Chongqing gas field blowout was a grave accident caused by negligence, Vice-Minister of the State Administration on Work Safety Sun Huashan said Friday, according to a CCTV report.

This is the first time a senior official has publicly spoken out on the nature of the accident that claimed 234 lives.

Sun was leading a group of seven Chinese experts on a visit to the accident site in Kaixian County, in Southwest China's Chongquing Municipality.

After five days of thorough investigations, Sun said they now believe the accident was caused by numerous acts of workplace negligence.

First of all, he said, developers of the gas well underestimated the production capacity of the well and were not fully prepared technically for such a productive well of high sulfur content gas.

Moreover, workers on site had not followed operational regulations strictly and did not allow enough time for sufficient drilling mud to circulate to control the pressure.

Had workers been vigilant and detected signs of a forthcoming accident in time, had they kept to the rules and not torn down a necessary blowout prevention valve, or if they had ignited the blowout gas quickly enough, fewer people would have lost their lives, Sun said.

The next step, he added, is to decide who was responsible for the disaster and have them pay the price.

This accident has taught a valuable lesson on workplace safety, he said.

Those who were most affected by the accident, the people of Gaoqiaozhen Township in Kaixian County, returned to their normal lives and students in primary and middle schools returned to class Friday.

By People's Daily Online


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