A massive fire sent flames and black smoke pouring Friday from a 42-storey skyscraper in central China belonging to the country’s largest telecoms operator, but no casualties were reported, officials said.
Dozens of floors burned in the China Telecom building in the city of Changsha, the capital of central Hunan province. The city’s fire department said it sent 280 firefighters who were able to quickly extinguish the blaze on the 218-meter (720-foot) building.
No injuries or deaths have been reported, China Telecom said in a statement. It said there was no disruption to cellphone service, but social media users complained of being unable to use their phones.
Videos of the blaze showed one side of the building scorched black, with debris falling to the ground. Other videos from local media showed workers inside managing to evacuate the building.
There was no immediate information on the cause of the blaze.
The 218-metre (715ft) building, completed in 2000, is located near a major ring road, according to CCTV.
Deadly fires are common in China, where lax enforcement of building codes and rampant unauthorised construction can make it difficult for people to flee burning buildings.
In July last year, a warehouse fire in north-eastern Jilin province killed at least 15 people and injured at least 25, according to state media reports.
The month before that, a fire killed 18 people – mostly children – at a martial arts school in central Henan province, causing an uproar over fire safety standards.
A further two dozen people died in blazes in Beijing’s migrant neighbourhoods in 2017, while 58 perished when a fire swept through a 28-storey Shanghai housing block in 2010.
