37 confirmed dead, over 200 injured in Bangladesh container depot fire, explosions

DHAKA: The death toll has risen to 37 people in a container depot fire on Saturday night in Bangladesh's Chattogram district, about 242 km southeast of capital Dhaka, a senior official said Sunday.

The fire followed by explosions broke out in one of the containers loaded with chemicals in the container yard located in Sitakunda on the outskirts of Chattogram.

The district's chief administrator Mohammad Mominur Rahman told Xinhua over mobile phone that the death toll of the depot fire has risen to 37 by Sunday afternoon after "another 23 people succumbed to their injuries".

He said at least 200 others sustained burn injuries in the devastating fire that broke out at about 8.00 pm local time (1400 GMT) Saturday at the private BM Container Depot Ltd, a Netherlands-Bangladesh joint venture company.

All the victims were shifted to hospitals, mostly suffering from mild to heavy burns, with several of them in critical condition. A fire official warned that the death toll is likely to rise.

The district's administration chief said 16 firefighting units had been striving to put out the blaze, which was almost under control early Sunday.

-- BERNAMA