In this photo provided by China's Xinhua News Agency, a truck sits on the expressway bridge which partially collapsed due to an explosion in Mianchi County, Sanmenxia, central China's Henan Province, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2013. Fireworks for Lunar New Year celebrations exploded on a truck in central China, destroying part of an elevated highway Friday and sending vehicles plummeting 30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground.
Rescuers work at the accident site where an expressway bridge partially collapsed due to a truck explosion in Mianchi County, Sanmenxia, central China's Henan Province, Friday, Feb. 1, 2013. A truckload of fireworks intended for Lunar New Year celebrations went off Friday in a massive, deadly explosion that destroyed part of an elevated highway in central China, sending vehicles plummeting 30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground
In this Feb. 1, 2013 photo provided by China's Xinhua News Agency, rescuers work at the accident locale where an 80 meter (260 foot) section of an expressway bridge collapsed due to an explosion in Mianchi County of Sanmenxia City in central China's Henan Province. An elevated portion of highway in central China collapsed on Friday after a truck loaded with fireworks for Lunar New Year celebrations exploded, killing at least nine people and sending vehicles plummeting 30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground.
Rescuers look for survivors near a wreckage of vehicles after an expressway bridge partially collapsed on the Lianhuo highway in Mianchi county, Henan province February 1, 2013. According to Xinhua News Agency, five people have died and eight others were injured after an expressway bridge partially collapsed due to a truck explosion Friday morning in central China's Henan Province, local government said. The truck was loaded with fireworks and the explosion caused several vehicles to tumble from the 30-meter-high bridge in Mianchi County, a publicity official of Sanmenxia told Xinhua on Friday afternoon.
In this photo provided by China's Xinhua News Agency, rescuers work at the accident site where an expressway bridge partially collapsed due to a truck explosion in Mianchi County, Sanmenxia, central China's Henan Province, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2013. Fireworks for Lunar New Year celebrations exploded on a truck in central China, destroying part of an elevated highway Friday and sending vehicles plummeting 30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground. State media had conflicting reports on casualties.
Rescuers work at the accident site where an
expressway bridge partially collapsed due to a truck explosion in Mianchi
County, Sanmenxia, central China's Henan Province, Friday, Feb. 1, 2013.
Fireworks for Lunar New Year celebrations exploded on a truck in central China,
destroying part of an elevated highway Friday and sending vehicles plummeting
30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground. State media had conflicting reports
on casualties.
Rescuers work at the accident site where an expressway bridge partially collapsed due to a truck explosion in Mianchi County, Sanmenxia, central China's Henan Province, Friday, Feb. 1, 2013. A truckload of fireworks intended for Lunar New Year celebrations went off Friday in a massive, deadly explosion that destroyed part of an elevated highway in central China, sending vehicles plummeting 30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground.
Chinese paramilitary policemen pull at car wreckage at the accident site where an expressway bridge partially collapsed due to a truck explosion in Mianchi County, Sanmenxia, central China's Henan Province, Friday, Feb. 1, 2013. A truckload of fireworks intended for Lunar New Year celebrations went off Friday in a massive, deadly explosion that destroyed part of an elevated highway in central China, sending vehicles plummeting 30 meters (about 100 feet) to the ground
CCTV said Saturday that the truck that exploded took the road without proper registration and had false papers saying it was transporting general merchandise. It said police detained four suspects but did not provide further details.
Preliminary investigations blamed the explosion for the collapse of the elevated highway, according to a statement by the provincial government of Henan. An 80-meter (260-foot) stretch of the highway in the province's Mianchi county collapsed, scattering blackened chunks of debris and shattered the windows of a nearby truck stop.
A truck driver interviewed on CCTV said he was only 20 meters (yards) away from the explosion.
"I heard a huge bang and immediately braked. I saw small fireballs falling down one by one," said the unidentified truck driver, whose truck windshield was smashed from the impact of the blast.
Photos posted online by Xinhua showed a stretch of elevated highway gone, with one truck's back wheels perched at the edge of a shorn-off section of the highway. Other photos showed firefighters below spraying water on scorched hunks of concrete, wrecked trucks and flattened shipping containers.
There was no immediate word on the cause of the explosion. It occurred about 90 kilometers (55 miles) west of Luoyang, an ancient capital of China known for grottoes of Buddhist statues carved from limestone cliffs.
Fireworks are an enormously popular part of Chinese Lunar New Year festivities. To meet the demand, fireworks are made, shipped and stored in large quantities, sometimes in unsafe conditions.
A result is periodic catastrophe: In 2006, on the first day of the Lunar New Year, a storeroom of fireworks exploded at a temple fair in Henan, killing 36 people and injuring dozens more. In 2000, an unlicensed fireworks factory in southern China exploded, killing 33 people, including 13 primary and secondary school students working there.
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