FENGCHENG – As many as 40 people have died after a platform under construction at a power plant’s cooling tower in eastern China’s Jiangxi province collapsed on Thursday, state media reported.
The accident happened in Fengcheng at around 7 a.m. (2300GMT), and rescuers are on the scene according to media reports.
The death toll was likely to rise because an unknown number of people were still trapped under the debris. Five injured workers have been sent to hospital.
There were 68 workers on the scaffolding at the time of the accident, local media reported. The cooling tower is part of a multi-billion dollars coal-fired power plant that was set to be completed in 2018.
Deadly accidents are relatively common at industrial sites in China, and anger over lax standards is growing after three decades of swift economic growth marred by incidents from mining disasters to factory fires.
China has vowed to improve safety at such facilities. President Xi Jinping has said authorities would learn the lessons paid for with blood after chemical blasts in the port city of Tianjin last year killed more than 170 people.
