Tianjin Explosions Point to Risk of Storing Toxic Chemicals
ANDREW JACOBS August 14, 2015
天津危險品倉庫爆炸原因未明，政府管理受質疑
傑安迪2015年8月14日
TIANJIN, China — This bustling port city about a 90-minute drive from the Chinese capital confronted scenes of death and devastation on Thursday — huge gray plumes of smoke, vast parking lots of charred vehicles, blocks of high-rises with blown-out windows — and questions about what had caused the terrifying explosions at a warehouse storing a witches' brew of toxic chemicals.
中國天津——這是一座繁華的港口城市，離中國首都約90分鐘車程。本週四，它展現出一幅幅死亡和毀滅的場景 ——空中翻滾著巨大的灰色煙團，大型停車場裡滿是燒焦的車輛，一棟棟高樓的窗戶被震碎。這座城市還面臨著這樣一個問題：在一座存放詭譎莫測的有毒化學品的倉庫裡，是什麼引起了可怖的爆炸？
As the fatalities reached 50 from the blasts on Wednesday night, rescue workers combed the rubble of the city's flattened warehouse district for bodies while hundreds of people crowded hospitals. Throughout the day, hundreds more lined up to donate blood in the wilting heat.
爆炸在本週三晚間發生，迄今死亡人數已達50人。在一片炸平的倉庫區，救援人員在碎石瓦礫中搜尋屍體，同時有數百人擠在醫院裡。一整天裡，有數以百計的民眾冒著酷暑排隊獻血。
The blasts , at a company licensed to store hazardous chemicals, left more than 500 people wounded, 52 of them critically, and produced shock waves felt for miles.
這次爆炸發生在一家獲准存放危險化學品的公司。爆炸導致500多人受傷，其中52人傷勢嚴重，爆炸產生的衝擊波在數英里之外都可以感覺到。
Many of the wounded were hit by flying glass and other debris as thousands of apartment windows blew in, some more than a mile from the explosions.
很多傷者是被飛起的玻璃和其他碎片擊中的。數千所公寓的窗戶被沖擊波震碎砸進屋內，有些公寓距離爆炸現場逾一英里。
At least 12 of the dead were firefighters who had responded to earlier reports of a blaze at the chemical storage site run by Ruihai International Logistics, a four-year-old company that unloads and stores hazardous cargo, the state news media and government officials said .
死者中至少有12人是消防員，他們在接到發生火災的報告時，前往瑞海國際物流公司的一個化學品存放點撲火。官方媒體和政府官員說，瑞海國際物流公司成立於四年前，經營危險貨物的卸載和存儲業務。
Officials have not explained precisely how firefighters sought to extinguish the initial blaze. But at least some of the stored chemicals were known to produce flammable gas when wet, raising the possibility that the firefighters might have inadvertently contributed to the disaster if they sprayed the flames with water.
對於消防隊最初是如何嘗試撲滅火災的，官員們也沒有作確切解釋。但那裡存放的化學物質至少有部分在遇水時會產生易燃氣體，因此消防隊員如果用水噴向火焰，就有可能在無意間加劇了這場災難。
On Thursday afternoon, fires at the site continued to produce a steady cloud of smoke after Tianjin officials, unsure about the nature of the chemicals, decided to let the blazes burn out on their own. The state news media also reported that a military team of specialists in handling chemicals had been sent to Tianjin.
由於天津官員不能確定化學品的性質，決定讓它自行燃盡，因此本週四下午，火災現場仍在徐徐冒出黑煙。官方新聞媒體還報導，處理化學品的軍方專業小組已被派往天津。
Residents of the Binhai district, frustrated by the lack of reliable information, said they were unsure whether the air was safe, and many people continued to wear disposable face masks throughout the day.
在濱海新區，居民們因為得不到可靠的信息而感到失望。他們說，無法確定空氣是否安全，很多人仍然整天戴著一次性口罩。
“Right now, we don't know anything,” said Sun Meirong, 52, an office cleaner who trudged down 13 flights of stairs to safety with her 1-year-old grandson after the explosions blew in the windows and front door of her apartment.
“眼下我們什麼都不知道，”52歲的辦公室清潔工孫美容說。在爆炸擊破了她家的窗戶和大門後，孫美容帶著1歲孫子從13樓艱難地走下樓梯，達到安全處。
The devastation was worst in the port area, a sparsely populated expanse of warehouses and parking lots nearly 40 miles from the heart of Tianjin. Had the blast occurred during the day, the death toll would have most likely been far higher. Favorable winds on Thursday also shielded residents from greater harm by blowing the toxic plume out to sea.
港口區域遭受的破壞最為嚴重，那里人煙稀少，有大片的倉庫和停車場，距離天津市中心約40英里。爆炸如果發生在白天，死亡人數可能還會高很多。本週四的風向有利，將毒氣吹向海面，也讓居民免於蒙受更大的傷害，
Ruihai's website was inaccessible, and calls to the company were met with a busy signal. Also inaccessible was the website for the Tianjin Administration for Industry and Commerce, the agency that collects information about companies, their executives and shareholders. In a social media post, the agency said the blast had forced it to close down temporarily.
瑞海公司的網站無法訪問，該公司的電話一直提示佔線。天津工商局擁有該公司及其高管和股東的信息，但其網站目前也無法訪問。在社交媒體上發布的帖子中，該局說，爆炸致使網站系統暫時關閉。
According to the Tianjin Tanggu Environmental Monitoring Station, the company stored a collection of toxic industrial chemicals, including sodium cyanide , toluene diisocyanate andcalcium carbide . The company was also licensed to handle highly combustible substances such as compressed and liquefied natural gas.
天津市塘沽環境監測站的資料顯示，該公司存放的有毒工業化學品包括氰化鈉、甲苯二異氰酸酯和電石。該公司也擁有處理壓縮和液化天然氣等高度易燃物質的許可證。
In a statement on Thursday, Greenpeace warned that many of the substances posed worrying threats to human health. It said that sodium cyanide, a compound used in mining, is especially toxic, while toluene diisocyanate, used to make polyurethane products, is a carcinogen and highly explosive.
綠色和平組織(Greenpeace)本週四發布聲明，警告說其中很多物質有可能危害人體健康。聲明稱，用於採礦的氰化鈉毒性尤其大，而用於製造聚氨酯產品的甲苯二異氰酸酯是一種致癌物，極具爆炸性。
With rain forecast for Friday, Greenpeace warned about the danger of airborne pollutants seeping into groundwater.
本週五預報有降雨，綠色和平警告稱，空氣污染物可能因此滲入地下水。
The disclosure that dangerous chemicals were stored less than a mile from dense residential areas raised questions about the government's role in monitoring operations at the site.
危險化學品的存放位置距離人口稠密的住宅區不到一英里，這令民眾對政府在監督該區域的經營時所起到的作用提出了質疑。
Middle-class Chinese, increasingly aware of the perils of chemical plants and storage depots in urban areas, have in recent years organized huge street protests demanding that such facilities be relocated to less populated areas.
中國的中產階級越來越意識到，在市區開設化工廠和儲存庫存在危險，並在近些年來組織了大型街頭抗議活動，要求將此類設施遷至人口稀少的地區。
It appears that officials in Tianjin were aware of the risks. In recent weeks, officials with the city's Administration of Work Safety met with a number of local chemical companies and asked them to ensure the safety of the substances on their premises, citing summer weather that included “extreme heat, high humidity and heavy rain,” according to an Aug. 6 posting on the agency's website.
天津的官員似乎認識到有這種危險。天津市安全生產監督管理局8月6日在其網站發布的消息顯示，最近幾週，該局官員與當地一些化學公司舉行會議，要求它們確保其經營場所內物資的安全，稱夏季“高溫、高濕、暴雨等極端天氣頻繁”。
At a news conference on Thursday afternoon, Wen Wurui, a senior environmental official, played down the threat of contaminated air, saying emission readings in the city had dropped to safe levels in the hours after the initial blasts.
週四下午召開的新聞發布會上，天津市環保局局長溫武瑞淡化了受污染的空氣構成的威脅，稱該市的污染物排放水平在首次爆炸發生幾個小時後就降至安全水平。
“The pollution will mostly spread to the Bohai Sea, and it will have no effect on Beijing,” he said, referring to waters east of Tianjin.
環保官員表示，爆炸釋放的污染物主要向天津以東的渤海方向擴散，對北京市空氣質量無影響。
As the extent of the disaster became apparent on Thursday, government officials moved quickly to control the flow of information. Comments on social media criticizing the government were promptly deleted, and for much of the day, the city's main news channel played Korean soap operas, prompting ridicule on social media.
雖然這場災難的嚴重程度在周四已經變得非常明顯，但政府官員迅速採取行動，控制信息的流動。社交媒體上批評政府的評論立即被刪除，該市主要的新聞頻道在當天大部分時間裡播放韓劇，此舉在社交媒體上招致了嘲諷。
One man who claimed to be an employee of the channel, Tianjin TV, took the rare step of openly castigating the government on social media. The man said that the station had sent 100 reporters into the field but that the authorities had insisted that only reports from central government news outlets like CCTV be used.
一名自稱是天津電視台工作人員的男子採取罕見舉動，在社交媒體上譴責政府。這名男子稱，電視台派出了100名記者前往現場進行報導，但當局堅持要求只能採用中央電視台等中央政府新聞機構的報導。
In another posting, Yang Anyi, a local university student, ridiculed broadcasts that featured government officials, including Tianjin's mayor, Huang Xingguo, and President Xi Jinping, who urged rescue workers to wage an “all-out effort” to save the injured and contain the fire.
在另一個帖子中，當地大學生楊安憶嘲諷了有關天津市長黃興國等政府官員及國家主席習近平的報導。習近平敦促救援人員“全力”救治傷員，控制火情。
“Why the hell give him such big coverage while he is not the one who got injured!” she wrote.
她寫道，“媽的為啥說他那麼多，他又不是被炸了的！”
The Tianjin Internet Police issued a warning that those who spread rumors about the accident would be “severely dealt with according to the law.”
天津網警發布警告稱，將“依法嚴肅處理”造謠網民。
On the streets of Binhai, tensions seemed to rise with the stifling August heat. At Taida Hospital, where scores of the injured were taken, grieving relatives assaulted foreign journalists, and some residents criticized what they said was an inadequate government response.
在濱海新區的街道上，緊張情緒似乎因為8月悶熱的天氣而有所加劇。在收治了數十名受傷人員的泰達醫院，悲傷的親屬粗暴阻攔外國記者，一些居民批評稱政府反應不力。
“There were two or three thousand people living in that neighborhood, and they could have been notified earlier to evacuate,” said Wang Dong, 55, a taxi driver who sustained a head injury when the door of his apartment blew off its hinges. “ I'm not sure why they did nothing at all to alert us.”
“大約有兩三千人住在那邊的小區，他們本來可以早點獲得撤離的通知，”55歲的出租車司機王東說。“我不知道他們為什麼沒有提醒我們。”家裡的門被炸開時，他的頭部受了傷。
At Qihang Jiayuan, an area of 30-story apartment buildings, a wearied security guard argued with residents desperate to check on their apartments as a dog, perhaps separated from its owners, ambled anxiously along the glass-strewn boulevard.
在矗立著30層公寓樓的小區啟航嘉園，一名疲憊的保安在與急切希望查看公寓的居民爭吵，一條可能與主人分離的狗在鋪滿碎玻璃的道路上焦急地走來走去。
Many residents said they would stay with relatives elsewhere in the city, but Wang Jinxue, 55, a laborer from nearby Hebei Province, said he was unsure where to go because the blasts had destroyed the company dormitory where he lived.
很多居民表示，他們會住在本市其他地方的親戚家裡，但55歲的工人王金學來自附近的河北省，他不知道去哪，因為爆炸破壞了他所居住的公司宿舍。
Dressed only in his underwear, a bandage wrapped around his head, he stared blankly when asked where he was headed. “I've got to go find my fellow workers,” he said, limping off.
王金學只穿著內衣，頭部纏著繃帶，在被問到要去哪兒時，他眼神茫然。他說，“我得去找工友”，然後一瘸一拐地走開了。
本文內容版權歸紐約時報公司所有，任何單位及個人未經許可，不得擅自轉載或翻譯。
本文內容版權歸紐約時報公司所有，任何單位及個人未經許可，不得擅自轉載或翻譯。
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