A chemical explosion rocked the residents of Tianjin Tanggu at 11:30pm, August 12. The dangerous, illegal chemicals caused an explosion that destroyed everything in about two miles radius and it was felt by people more than six miles away. There was a huge mushroom cloud appeared after the explosions. Two other provinces, which near Tianjin, felt the aftershocks of the explosion.
There is the video of a Tianjin citizen caught the explosion.
According to the government official data, there are 150 people died from the explosion until August 30. Among the dead, there were 92 firefighters, 10 policemen and 48 citizens. In addition, 23 people were out of touch with others, and 12 of them are firefighters. Also, there were 367 people who need hospitalization.
However, that is only the official story.
The company responsible for the explosion is Ruihai International Logistics. They were stored too many chemicals illegally without telling residents, who lived only 1,000 yards away. It seems they were only able to get away with this because the company belongs to the son of the leader of the Public Security Bureau. Civilians reported on social media sites saying that over 1,000 people have died. All the hospitals in Tianjin are completely full with injured people.
Now, the Chinese Government has taken these reports down, and claiming that the numbers are much lower than they actually are. But the area around the explosion is completely destroyed, which showed by the pictures (from http://www.news.cn).
A lot of firemen were sent in to help handle the explosion. However, they didn’t know about the conditions they were going into. They tried to put out the fires with water, which causing another explosion. The Chinese government told people there were only 10 firemen died at that time, but from social media, some citizens around there post that: “The government send more than 300 firemen in to the explosion area, but only few of them came out.” One of the firemen who survived told people that they didn’t know the fire was because of chemicals, they were told that it was a regular fire.
Tianjin is near Beijing, which is the capitol of China. The government sent a lot of new soldiers from Beijing to Tianjin to help firemen. Among the dead, the youngest one is only 18 years old; the oldest one is 26. The soldiers going in knew it was dangerous, but they had to go. There was even a screenshot from WeChat, which is an app similar to Messenger, by one soldier telling his friend that: ” if I dies, please take care of my father.”
The screenshot
Because of the fire and chemicals, the air quality in this residential province has drastically decreased. All the people, who pass by the brink of that area, can smell the chemicals. However, the government refuses to acknowledge this. They told people the air quality is fine. But a reporter tried to go there and report, but within four minutes of breathing the contaminated air, he felt he couldn’t breathe and sick.
Hundreds of tons of sodium cyanide were being stored in a warehouse very close to the residential area of Tianjin. When it exploded, it left a very toxic mess that destroyed everything. The worst part about all of this was that none of the residents of Tianjin were told or even knew anything about what was being shipped so close to their homes. Even the workers who shipped the dangerous chemicals didn’t know what cargo they were delivering. Moreover, the government keeps deleting posts about the death toll, how many have been injured, and the severity of the explosion.
While this is going on, the public has been trying to report the truth, but they are being censored. The government refuses to let any foreign reporters on the scene and have been heavily restricting the news that does come out. They even don’t allowed the reporter from CNN report it.
CNN crew harassed on live TV
The reported cause of this explosion has been ignored on the part of the workers, which is no doubt because of their lack of knowledge of what they were shipping.
This is dangerous time for everyone near Tianjin Tanggu. The government is refusing to let the full story be written. They lying to the public when they do release news, but people are dying and being injured or sick because of it. Those who are trying to tell the truth and show what happened are being silenced. Even American new stations can’t report much on it because they don’t have enough information about it. The only reason we have any video at all is because residents who were close enough from the explosion happened to be awake and decided to film it.
Unfortunately, this type of cover up is not uncommon in China. There have been huge riots and public upsets that have been quieted and brushed away. It took over fifteen days for this news to finally come out, and more keeps spilling over.
Dead, rotting fish have been turning up in the water sources nearby, but the government’s claims that the area is still safe. People have died, even more have been injured, residential areas are no longer safes and the government is still lying about it. They needs to be a change in the way things are done for the safety of the people.
People only want the truth.
♥ Shuting Jiang ♥ 