Society

Fatal grassland blaze in SE China started by child

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-12-19 15:50

CHENGDU - A 6-year-old boy playing with matches started a grassland fire that killed 23 people in a southwest China Tibetan area earlier this month, the local authorities said Sunday.

The mother of the boy, whose identity was not disclosed, was also killed in the blaze, which raged through the plateau grassland in Dawu (Daofu in Mandarin) County, Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Garze, Sichuan Province, on December 5, a provincial publicity official said.

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The mother took her three sons to the grassland to fix the family's prayer streamers - commonly fixed on hilltops in a Tibetan Buddhist custom. One of the boys was playing with matches and lit a bunch of dried branches and cloth when his mother was not watching, the official said.

Winds drove the blaze over the grassland. The mother tried but failed to put out the fire, he said. The fire was put out a day later after 2,000 people joined the fire-fighting effort.

About two dozen soldiers and local residents were trapped when the wind turned at the initial stage of the operation. Twenty-two died at the scene and one critically injured person died in hospital on December 17.

Police say the child is too young to be prosecuted under the law, but no decision has been made as to whether action will be taken against his family.

Dawu sits in a forest-covered area at the eastern edge of Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. It has a population of 45,000, about 89 percent of whom are ethnic Tibetans.

A string of deadly fires has hit China in recent weeks as most of the country braces for an especially dry winter.

In the most recent tragedy, 58 people were killed in a Shanghai high-rise fire on November 15. Among the 71 others who were injured, more than 30 remain in hospital, including 11 who are seriously ill, doctors said.