China orders dangerous-chemicals inspections after blasts

The Work Safety Commission of China's cabinet, known as the State Council, issued a statement on its website on Friday announcing the nationwide inspections and pledging to learn from Thursday's explosions at the port of Tianjin, which killed at least 56 people and injured more than 700 others.

"The disastrous explosions at the ... hazardous materials warehouse at Tianjin caused huge loss of life and injuries, economic damages and social impact," the statement said. "The lessons are extremely profound."

Hundreds of firefighters continued to work to put out smoldering fires on Friday, and the official Xinhua news agency reported that 217 nuclear and biochemical materials experts from the Chinese military had been sent to the site to try to determine exactly what materials were involved in the blasts.

Firefighters' role questioned

There has been speculation that firefighters who arrived on the scene after the first explosion may have contributed to a second and more serious blast by using water to try to douse the flames.

However, the deputy head of the propaganda wing of China's fire department, Lei Jinde, said the firefighters should not be blamed.

"We knew there was calcium carbide inside but we didn't know whether it had already exploded," Lei said.

"At that point no one knew, it wasn't that the fire fighters were stupid," he said, stressing that the fire they first responded to was in a large warehouse and they didn't know the exact location of the calcium carbide, which forms flammable gas when it comes into contact with water.

The was also a bright spot on Friday when 19-year-old firefighter Zhou Ti was pulled from the rubble more than 24 hours after the blasts. Speaking from his hospital bet Zhou told state broadcaster CCTV that a fire had been spreading out of control when he and the rest of his crew arrived on the scene.

"I was knocked onto the ground at the first blast," said Zhou, who in the video footage appeared to have sustained serious injuries. "I covered my head and don't know what happened after that," he added.

Facility 'too close' to residential buildings

Questions were also being raised on Friday about why two residential buildings were located so close to a port handling hazardous chemicals.

The Communist Party's official newspaper, "The People's Daily," said the facility's construction had "clearly violated" safety rules, which require warehouses storing hazardous materials to be located at least one kilometer (0.6 miles) away from other public buildings and roads.

A few thousand people from the two residential buildings in question have been evacuated and were being housed in shelters set up at 10 schools.

pfd/sgb (Reuters, AP, AFP)