The explosions sparked massive fires which
tore through the city’s Cianjhen district, leaving a yawning trench
running for hundreds of metres down the middle of a major thoroughfare
and littering the streets with dead bodies.
Dramatic
video footage captured by dashboard cameras inside cars showed multiple
blasts and pillars of flame erupting from manholes as drivers
frantically tried to avoid being engulfed.
The National Fire Agency said the blasts killed at least 25 people and injured around 267 in Taiwan’s second largest city.
Four
firefighters who rushed to the scene after residents smelled gas were
among those killed in the blasts while rescuers were searching for two
others who went missing.
Premier Jiang Yi-huan
inspected the affected areas and said flags would be flown at half-mast
at government offices and schools across the island from August 5 for
three days to mourn the victims of the blasts as well as a fatal air
crash last week.
Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed
his condolences to the victims of the gas explosions, the official
Xinhua news agency said.
The blasts, believed to have been triggered by gas leaking from
underground pipelines, were powerful enough to flip cars and split open
paved roads.
One street had been ripped along its
length, swallowing several fire engines and other vehicles, while some
houses had their roofs blown off.
Workers were using cranes to lift up the vehicles and bulldozers to clean up the scene later Friday. In Bangladesh, a train smashed into a crowded bus carrying a bridal party west of the Bangladesh capital today morning leaving at least 10 people dead and 57 injured, police said.
Workers were using cranes to lift up the vehicles and bulldozers to clean up the scene later Friday. In Bangladesh, a train smashed into a crowded bus carrying a bridal party west of the Bangladesh capital today morning leaving at least 10 people dead and 57 injured, police said.
The Simanta Express
train ploughed through the bus and then dragged it at least 500 metres
(545 yards) along the tracks at Barobazar town near Bangladesh’s western
border with India, police inspector Mizanur Rahman told AFP.
“We’ve
recovered 10 bodies while 57 people have been hospitalised — all of
them from the bridal party. Conditions of several people are very
critical,” Rahman said. Police said the accident occurred at an
unguarded railway crossing, allowing cars and buses to move freely
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