BEIJING: Eight people lost their lives after a fire broke out in a shopping mall in China, CNN reported, citing Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
The blaze erupted in the shopping centre in Zingong, which is a city in China’s western province of Sichuan, at 6 pm local time on Wednesday.
Nearly 300 emergency workers and dozens of vehicles were dispatched from the local fire department to the site of the incident. The blaze was extinguished at 8.20 p.m. local time, according to CNN.
Thirty people in all have been pulled from the site, however, the actual number of people trapped remains unknown.
These kinds of incidents are not uncommon in China, a country with inadequate safety regulations and law enforcement, CNN said.
Earlier in January, a fire broke out at a mixed-use building in southeastern China, killing at least 39 people and injuring nine others.
That fire came days after another blaze broke out in the dormitory of a boarding school in the central province of Henan, claiming the lives of 13 children. (ANI)