Just after 8:40 p.m. on June 21, an explosion tore through the Fuyang Barbecue Restaurant in Yinchuan, in China’s northwestern Ningxia region. It was peak hour, on the eve of the Dragon Boat Festival, and families had come for grilled skewers and stir-fry. Thirty-one people died. Seven were injured.
Among the dead were high school students and retirees. Many died of smoke inhalation, according to local reporting, and the Shanghai news site The Paper said most deaths were from asphyxiation. A witness identified as Ms Chen described the scene to the site: “The air was full of gas.”
An hour of warning
Yinchuan’s public security department said that just after 7:30 p.m. the manager and chef called the fire department to report the smell of gas. A staff member was sent out to buy a replacement valve for the gas tank. The tank exploded while the valve was being swapped, according to one witness, and set off a second explosion in a natural gas line nearby. State broadcaster CCTV said the leak came from a liquefied petroleum gas tank in the kitchen.
Firefighters arrived an hour after the first call, and five minutes after the blast. More than 100 rescue personnel and 20 vehicles were sent. Video from the platform Douyin showed responders on ladders trying to reach victims trapped on the second floor.
Xinhua first reported only one death and many injuries. A staff member told The Paper the true situation was far worse.
Arrests and aftermath
Nine people, including the owner, shareholders, manager and staff, were detained, and their assets were frozen. On Saturday police formally arrested four of them: the owner, two shareholders and the manager. Xinhua said the charge was “causing a serious accident through negligence.”
President Xi Jinping demanded “all-out efforts” to treat the injured and to strengthen safety supervision in key industries. The provincial government moved 64 families from nearby residential compounds into hotels, and Yinchuan authorities promised an investigation into related industries.
China’s financial regulator said 22 people on the casualty list were insured, and that the restaurant carried property insurance. Compensation exceeded 14 million yuan. Dr Lyu Guozhong of the national emergency medical research centre said the injured were recovering well. Two with slight burns would soon go home, while doctors had treated severely burned patients for air passage and lung injuries.
It was the deadliest explosion in China since 2019, when 78 people died at a chemical plant in Jiangsu province. Twenty-five died in a gas blast in Hubei’s Shiyan in June 2021.
Sources
- 2023 Yinchuan gas explosion – Wikipedia
- Four arrested over China barbecue restaurant blast that killed 31
- 31 dead in gas explosion at Chinese barbecue restaurant
