High-Rise Fire Kills 53 in Shanghai; Scores Hurt

Updated at 12:29 a.m. ET

Police detained unlicensed welders Tuesday for accidentally starting a fire that engulfed a high-rise apartment building under renovation in China's business capital, leaving 53 people dead and scores more in hospitals.

A preliminary investigation showed that the four unlicensed welders improperly operated their welding equipment, setting off Monday's fire in Shanghai, state television and media websites reported.

Witnesses and building residents quoted earlier by state media said the fire began when building materials caught alight. The fire then spread quickly to scaffolding covering the 29-story building, which houses a number of retired teachers as well as other families.

Aside from the death toll of 53, the city government said Tuesday that more than 70 other people had been rushed to hospitals.

While some survivors were housed overnight in the gym of a nearby retirement home, others searched for missing family members.

Some residents escaped by climbing down scaffolding that had been put up for the renovations.

The fire was one of China's worst in recent years, and disasters of this scale are rare in Shanghai, a wealthy city that is one of the country's best run urban centers.

There were sad scenes at hospitals as relatives searched for their loved ones. At Jing'an hospital, the father of Wang Yinxing, a 30-year-old woman who lived on the 22nd floor of the building, searched a list of survivors at the hospital but could not find his daughter's name.

"She called her husband and said: 'It's on fire! I have escaped from the 22nd floor to the 24th floor,' but then the phone got cut off," the father, Wang Zhiliang, 65, said with tears in his eyes. "That was the last we heard from her."

Some residents escaped by climbing down scaffolding that had been put up for the renovations. A resident identified as Mr. Zhou told Hong Kong broadcaster Phoenix TV that he and his wife were napping in their 23rd floor apartment when they smelled smoke. He said they climbed down the scaffolding four stories before being rescued by firefighters.

An unidentified woman told Shanghai television her only option was to climb down the scaffolding. "If I jumped I would die, if I stayed (in the building) I would die," she said.

One local resident complained Tuesday that firefighters, some who climbed scaffolding to save people, had been late getting to the blaze.

"They were too slow. The first fire truck came at least 25 minutes later," said a woman who would identify herself only by her surname Zhen.

She said she lived across the street and called the fire department as soon as she saw the flames.

Survivors were taken to nine Shanghai hospitals, and a doctor at Jing'an Central Hospital surnamed Zhang said more than 20 seriously hurt people had been admitted for treatment. Most of the survivors had suffered asphyxia from the smoke fumes, another doctor said.

Shanghai state television showed survivors at another hospital in the city, covered in thick blankets as they emerged from a high-pressure oxygen chamber.

Xinhua quoted local residents as saying the building was built in the 1990s and housed mainly teachers from several schools in Jing'an District, many of them retirees.

Shanghai, a city of 20 million and venue of the recently concluded World Expo, has seen a construction frenzy in recent years, ranging from high rises that dot its skyline to new subway lines, highways and airport upgrades. But unsafe building work remains a chronic problem in China.

Last year, a nearly finished 13-story apartment building in Shanghai collapsed, killing one worker. Investigations showed that excavated dirt piled next to the building may have caused the collapse.