Learning a lesson

The 75-sq-m cave-in on the construction site of the Hangzhou subway on Saturday comes just a week after the central government announced its 4 trillion-yuan fiscal stimulus package. The accident that killed four and left 17 missing till yesterday afternoon has its lesson for similar projects elsewhere. It is a reminder that feasibility studies must be carefully conducted before and great caution employed after large-scale infrastructure projects are launched.

The Hangzhou subway with an estimated investment of 100 billion yuan is a huge infrastructure project in Zhejiang province. The cave-in is as deep as 15 m and residents living within 500 m have already been evacuated to avert any possible further tragedy and to facilitate rescue operations.

Work on the entire line has already been suspended. An investigation team has been organized to probe the cause of the accident and make sure no similar cave-ins take place before the construction is resumed.