by Our Foreign Desk

THE death toll from a huge explosion at a warehouse in the Chinese port city of Tianjin rose to at least 50 yesterday.

Twelve of the dead were among the 1,000 firefighters sent to tackle the blaze, while 36 more were reported missing.

Nearby buildings were gutted and 1,000 new cars parked nearby were incinerated. The city council said that 701 people had been injured, 71 of them seriously.

The huge explosion at a hazardous chemical storage site just before midnight on Wednesday lit up the night sky with a series of enormous fireballs and shattered windows several miles away.

“It was like what we were told a nuclear bomb would be like,” said lorry driver Zhao Zhencheng.

“I’ve never even thought I’d see such a thing. It was terrifying, but also beautiful.”

There was no indication of what had caused the blasts, and no immediate sign of any toxic fumes in the air as firefighters brought the blaze largely under control by morning.

However, the Tianjin government suspended further firefighting efforts to allow a team of chemicals experts to survey hazardous materials at the site.

Authorities said that the initial explosion was at the Ruihai Logistics warehouse, which stores hazardous materials including flammable petrochemicals, sodium cyanide and toluene diisocyanate.

The first blast triggered a much larger explosion. The National Earthquake Bureau said the first was equivalent to 3 tons of TNT, and the second to 21 tons — similar to a tactical nuclear weapon.

Tianjin Environmental Protection Bureau head Wen Wuru said that there had been no reports of toxic fumes from air monitoring stations, but that water samples were still being examined.

Senior managers at the company have been detained and President Xi Jinping has demanded severe punishment for anyone found responsible for the explosions.

In Britain, the Fire Brigades Union said it was saddened by the loss of the 12 firefighters.

“Firefighters across the world face similar risks and challenges and the thoughts of all firefighters here in the UK will be with our colleagues in China and their families,” said general secretary Matt Wrack.