CHITTAGONG
\nAt least 38 people died and hundreds were injured after a fire that sparked a huge chemical explosion and was still blazing on Sunday at a shipping container depot in Bangladesh, officials said.
\nAccording to AFP, The toll was expected to rise with some of the more than 300 people injured in a serious condition.
\nVolunteers, some with only flip flops on their feet, brought bodies from the smouldering, wreckage-strewn facility, saying there were more inside.
\nThe fire started late on Saturday at the huge depot in Sitakunda storing around 4,000 containers, many of them filled with garments destined for Western retailers, about 40 kilometres from the major southern port of Chittagong.
\nThen containers holding chemicals exploded, engulfing firefighters, journalists and others in an inferno, hurtling people and debris through the air, turning the night sky a blazing orange and rattling buildings kilometres away.
\nMujibur Rahman, the director of B.M. Container Depot, the firm operating the facility with around 600 workers, said that the cause of the fire was still unknown.
\nThe container depot held hydrogen peroxide, fire service chief Brigadier General Main Uddin told reporters. \u201cWe still could not control the fire because of the existence of this chemical,\u201d he said.
\nPolice official Mohammad Alauddin told reporters on Sunday that the death toll \u201chas risen to 38\u201d, as firefighters continued to douse pockets of fire with hoses and as doctors in packed hospitals treated the injured.
\nAt least 40 firefighters and 10 police officers were hurt, Chittagong regional Police Chief Anwar Hossain told, At least five firefighters were among those killed.
\n\u201cThe number of fatalities is expected to rise as some of the injured are in critical condition,\u201d Hossain said.
\n\u201cThese people, including several journalists who were doing Facebook lives, are still not accounted for,\u201d Elias Chowdhury, regional chief doctor, told.
\n\u201cThere are still some bodies inside the fire-affected places. I saw eight or 10 bodies,\u201d one volunteer told reporters.
\n\u201cI was standing inside the depot. The explosion just threw me some 10 metres from where I was standing. My hands and legs are burned,\u201d lorry driver Tofael Ahmed said.
\nMohammad Ali, 60, who has a nearby grocery store, said the blast was deafening.
\n\u201cA cylinder flew around half a kilometre from the fire spot to our small pond when the explosion occurred,\u201d he told.
\n\u201cThe explosion sent fireballs into the sky. Fireballs were falling like rain. We were so afraid we immediately left our home to find refuge, we thought the fire would spread to our locality as it is very densely populated.\u201d
\nChowdhury, the chief doctor in Chittagong, said the injured had been rushed to different hospitals as doctors were brought back from holiday to help.
\nRequests for blood donations flooded social media, for the injured people.
\nThe army said it had deployed 250 troops to prevent chemicals flowing into the sea with sand bags.
\nMominur Rahman, chief administrator of Chittagong district, said while the fire was largely under control, there were \u201cstill several pockets of fire\u201d.
\n\u201cFirefighters are trying to control these pockets of fires. The fire has spread to at least seven acres of land inside the depot,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
CHITTAGONG At least 38 people died and hundreds were injured after a fire that sparked a huge chemical explosion and was still blazing on Sunday at a shipping container depot in Bangladesh, officials said. According to AFP, The toll was expected to rise with some of the more than 300 people injured in a serious […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264792,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[432,488,1429],"class_list":{"0":"post-264752","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-bangladesh","9":"tag-fire","10":"tag-port"},"yoast_head":"\n