Latest:

At least 65 dead, 150 injured in E China factory blast

Relatives of factory workers said the workshop is very dirty and full of dust. A worker was reportedly forced to quit due to the dust problem. A person lost contact with his mother who was working in the factory. – From Xinmin Evening News

14:03

Xinhua said the exterior wall of the workshop was badly damaged in the blast, with two giant holes formed in the wall and all windows broken and scattered 50 meters around the workshop. The blast was reportedly so powerful it launched heavy equipment outside the workshop.

13:55

Captain of Blue Sky Rescue Team said the factory area where the explosion happened is as big as a football field, taking up about one-third of the whole factory. The injured people are mainly male aged 20 to 30. The captain said many of the seriously wounded victims died on the road to hospitals and in the process of treatment. The time needed for transferring the injured was about 40 minutes as the roads were unblocked.

13:14

An official at Shanghai Ruijin Hospital said doctors are sparing no effort to rescue the injured, adding that some of the seriously wounded remain in unstable condition. Some of the injured have been transferred to Suzhou and Wuxi for further treatment. - as posted on the Weibo account of the Morning Post, a Shanghai-based newspaper. 

Massive factory blast kills 65 in E China

Xinhua News Agency says the blast happened at around 7:37 a.m. inside a wheel hub polishing workshop owned by the Kunshan Zhongrong Metal Products Co., Ltd.

An initial probe indicated that the explosion might be caused by flames igniting dusts, the Ministry of Public Security said via its official weibo microblog site.

Officials are working on rescue efforts and providing medical treatment.

Five medical experts from Shanghai are on their way to the explosion site.

Kunshan govenrment also urged people to donate blood of all types at four blood-collection centers, the local government's media office said on Weibo.

Located about halfway between Shanghai to the east and Suzhou to the west, Kunshan city is the eastern gateway of Jiangsu province and was once known as "a town for fish and rice."