At least 28 people are dead after a shoe factory caught fire in China’s Fujian Province on Thursday, July 9. The cause of the fire is still unknown, but local reporting suggests that debris piled in staircases hampered rescue efforts. 

According to local reporting and state media CCTV, the fire started Thursday at the Huiteng Shoes factory, in Jinjiang City. CCTV reports that the fire started on the first floor of the building, near a workshop and warehouse area.

Video footage of the blaze shows flames enveloping the five-story building, with thick clouds of black smoke billowing up into the sky. Several people were trapped on the roof, engulfed in smoke, awaiting rescue.

At least 183 personnel and 35 vehicles were dispatched from the fire department to put out the flames. A local firefighter told news agencies that large piles of manufacturing debris, such as shoe soles, piled in the staircases hampered firefighting and rescue efforts.

At the start of the fire, 239 people were in the building. While most were evacuated or rescued, two of the rescued were pronounced dead after evacuation to a hospital, and 26 were announced missing. Later, they were reported dead by state media. 

While the exact cause of the fire is still under investigation, the company owner and several others have been detained.

The event comes just two months after an explosion at a fireworks company in Hunan Province killed 37 – highlighting worker safety as a major issue. 

Jinjiang, the city where the blaze occurred is called the “Shoe Capital of China”. The city is home to 7,000 shoe companies and supportive industries, and produces over 1 billion pairs of athletic shoes annually.

According to AP, the city’s industrialization has often been held up as a positive example of China's manufacturing capabilities by President Xi Jinping (習近平). Following the disaster, Xi ordered a swift investigation of the incident, demanding that those responsible be held accountable.