25 dead after cargo ship fire at Chinese shipyard in Qingdao

At least 25 people have died after a fire tore through a foreign-flagged cargo ship undergoing maintenance at a shipyard in Qingdao, eastern China, in one of the country's deadliest recent maritime workplace accidents.

The vessel, Ocean Melody, was carrying 42 people when the fire broke out at the Beihai Shipbuilding yard, according to Chinese state media reports cited by the Associated Press.

Twelve people were evacuated and five others were taken to hospital with injuries. They were reported to be in stable condition.

That accounts for all 42 people who were on board.

The latest toll is higher than the initial reports, which put the number of deaths at 20 and five people missing as rescue operations continued.

Fire broke out during maintenance

The blaze started at about 11am local time on Thursday while the ship was undergoing repairs.

Firefighters brought the flames under control at around 2:30pm, according to reports from Chinese state media.

The incident sent thick smoke into the air around the shipyard.

The vessel was identified as the Ocean Melody, a bulk carrier sailing under the Liberian flag. Shipping data showed it had arrived in Qingdao on August 31 and was at the shipyard for maintenance.

The exact cause of the fire has not been established.

Authorities are expected to investigate how the blaze started, how quickly it spread and whether safety procedures at the repair facility were followed.

Xi orders urgent rescue response

The scale of the casualties prompted direct intervention from China's top leadership.

President Xi Jinping ordered an all-out search and rescue operation and called for efforts to prevent further risks arising from the incident.

Premier Li Qiang also instructed authorities to rescue anyone who could still be trapped and to guard against secondary disasters.

The response reflects the seriousness of the accident, particularly because it happened inside a major shipbuilding and repair facility rather than at sea.

Beihai Shipbuilding is part of China State Shipbuilding Corporation, one of the world's largest shipbuilding groups.

The bigger safety question

The Qingdao disaster comes less than a month after another serious accident at a Chinese shipyard.

On August 13, a vessel caught fire at the Huahai Shipyard in Fu'an, Fujian province. An explosion occurred while firefighters were battling the blaze.

Twelve people were injured, including 10 firefighters and two local workers. One of the firefighters later died from his injuries.

That accident and the Qingdao fire occurred at different facilities and there is no evidence linking the two.

But their proximity is likely to draw renewed attention to safety measures in China's shipbuilding and repair industry.

The country has also faced other deadly industrial fires this year. In July, a shoe factory blaze in Fujian province killed 28 people.

Those incidents have repeatedly brought questions about workplace safety, emergency access and the ability to evacuate workers quickly when industrial fires spread.

Investigation now becomes the focus

With the immediate firefighting operation completed, attention will turn to the circumstances surrounding the Qingdao fire.

Authorities have yet to publicly establish what caused the blaze or whether any safety rules were breached.

Those answers will be important because the vessel was in a controlled maintenance environment when the fire occurred.

Investigators will need to establish where the fire began, what materials may have fuelled it and why so many people were unable to escape.

For the families of the 25 people who died, however, those questions come after an immediate and painful reality.

A ship that had arrived in Qingdao for maintenance became the scene of a mass-casualty fire before the work could be completed.

The investigation will now have to determine how that happened — and whether the tragedy could have been prevented.

Category: International

About the Author

Maureen Onyango is a journalist passionate about storytelling, life coaching and spiritual lessons. She studied at the Kenya Institute of Management and enjoys telling stories that inform, inspire and empower communities.