Rescuers pulled one survivor, from the wreckage, a city official told reporters.
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The cause of the blast is still being investigated.
American Daniel Van Duren has shot what may be the most intense footage yet of the frenzied moments before, during and after Wednesday’s devastating explosion in the Chinese port city of Tianjin.
Specialists from sodium cyanide producers have been sent in to handle the chemicals as the evacuation proceeds.
Officials have only confirmed that calcium carbide, potassium nitrate and sodium nitrate were at the warehouse.
They say the extent of the damage makes it hard to identify which materials may have been present.
A team of more than 200 nuclear and biochemical materials experts from the military was quickly summoned to Tianjin to help address the situation, Xinhua reports. However, many residents, fearful of potential toxins in the air due to the hazardous chemicals released by the blasts, have taken to wearing masks.
Evacuees have been advised to wear long pants and face masks. About 700 people were injured, 71 seriously.
“They’ve nearly got a cocktail in the warehouse of the worst-case scenario”, said Craig Watt, General Manager of Chem-Safe Australia, a chemical safety consultancy in Australia. “We are extremely anxious”, she said.
Questions have also been raised over whether firefighters responding to an initial blaze at the warehouse could have contributed to the detonations by spraying water over risky substances. And if we get calcium carbide – especially if it’s hot – mixed with water, we form a very, very flammable and highly explosive gas called acetylene.
Thirteen firefighters and an unknown number of port workers were still missing, it said. “It’s not that the firefighters were stupid that they would still use water after knowing there was calcium carbide”.
But not all was clear amid emotional scenes as families of missing fire fighters sought answers about their loves ones and officials tried to keep media cameras away. “I covered my head and don’t know what happened after that”.
“When the blast occurred, several firefighters were working to put out the fire, and backup forces had just arrived”. But the cause of the fire has yet to be determined.
Photos and video have emerged showing incredible devastation from crumpled shipping containers thrown about and piled up and row upon row of incinerated cars.
The Tianjin Port Group Company said dozens of its employees remained unaccounted for, according to Xinhua.
The official Xinhua News Agency said the death toll of 21 could mark the highest for a firefighter rescue mission since the People’s Republic of China was established in 1949.
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Many safety decisions – including construction of residential buildings, roads and railways close by – were left to separate government agencies that did not communicate with each other, according to a commentary published online by the overseas edition of the People’s Daily, the ruling Communist Party’s official newspaper.
