More fireworks explosions

Fireworks can be spectacular, but following last month’s explosion at a Vietnamese fireworks factory that killed more than 20 people (see my blog of Oct 28), now there's news from China that 11 have died with another 17 injured at a fireworks factory at Cenxi in the southern region of Guangxi.

Two businessmen are reported to have been arrested. Controls on China’s fireworks industry are lax, and there have been a number of deadly incidents in recent years. In 2010, 19 people were killed in a blast in the southern province of Guangdong, and a similar number in an explosion at Yichun in Heilongjiang province.

India too is plagued by firework factory accidents. A blast in Thanjavur district of Tamil Nadu province on Friday killed nine people. The plant made high-decibel bangers and rockets.

And last month, two children lost their lives when a stack of fireworks exploded at a house at Dalowal in Pakistan. The blast was followed by a fire, and neighbours said the roof then collapsed before they could go in to help.

Bus crashes

A bus carrying farmers and traders home for Christmas has plunged 250 feet into a ravine in the Peruvian Andes, killing at least 42 people. They were travelling between Arequipa, Peru's elegant second largest city, and the town of Santo Tomas.

The accident happened in an area that was so remote that the nearest village did not have a doctor. A local schoolteacher said the road was potholed and in poor condition, but investigators will also be looking at whether a mechanical fault or recent rains might be a factor.

Back in 1995, 110 people are said to have been killed when a tanker carrying liquid benzene collided with a bus on the outskirts of Sriperumbudur in India’s Tamil Nadu state. If this figure is correct, this would probably be the worst bus crash in history.

Better documented is the accident in 2003 in which a coach drove into a reservoir near the town of Bethlehem in South Africa, killing 80. This too happened in a remote area, and it seems that the driver lost his way in the dark and found himself driving along a jetty towards the water. By the time he realised his mistake he was going too fast to stop.

Landslides - Africa, India, South America

Heavy rain has brought deadly landslides in Africa and India. At least 38 people have been killed in the Nilgiri Hills in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Continuing monsoon rains are hampering the rescue effort, and it’s feared the death toll may rise.

While in Tanzania’s Kilimanjaro province, four days of rain brought part of a mountain crashing down on the village of Goha, killing at least 20. Ironically, the area has been suffering from severe drought for the past two years.

The deadliest landslide in history was probably the one that devastated Venezuela’s coastal region in December 1999. Thirty-six inches of rain fell in just a few days, and flash floods and mudslides engulfed high rise buildings and effortlessly ripped away shanty towns perched precariously on ridges around the capital Caracas.

More than 20,000 homes were destroyed, and an estimated 140,000 people made homeless. The death toll has been estimated at anything up to 30,000. For more, see A Disastrous History of the World. (see also my blog of April 17)