At least 32 workers were confirmed dead and two others injured
on Wednesday morning in a steel plant accident in northeast China's
Liaoning Province, local work safety
authorities said.
The accident occurred at 7:45?AM in a Qinghe Special Steel
Corporation workshop in Tieling City when a steel ladle -- used for
pouring molten steel -- suddenly sheared off from the iron rail
linking it to the blast furnace.
The ladle was moving into pouring position above a worktable
when it fell, spewing out white-hot molten metal at around 1,500
degrees Celsius into a room where workers had gathered as they
changed shift. The liquid metal engulfed the room, bursting through
the door and windows and burying the workers.
Work safety officials who rushed to the site said that the
bodies of 32 workers have been recovered and the injured have been
taken to hospital.
The cause of the accident is being investigated.
(Xinhua News Agency April 18, 2007)