Xinjia Express Hotel (
) was a hotel in
Licheng District Licheng may refer to the following locations:
*Licheng County (), of Changzhi, Shanxi
*Licheng District, Jinan (), Shandong
*Licheng District, Putian (), Fujian
*Licheng District, Quanzhou (), Fujian
*Licheng Subdistrict, Xianyou County (), Fujian
* ...
,
Quanzhou,
Fujian
Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...
, China. On 7 March 2020, while being used to quarantine
COVID-19
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...
patients, it collapsed from overloading resulting from illegal construction, killing 29 people and injuring another 42.
Background
The 6.5-story Xinjia Hotel began operating in June 2018 and had 80 rooms on the 4th-7th floors.
During the
COVID-19 outbreak, this hotel was used for quarantining cases of COVID-19.
This particular building had been completed in July 2012, as a 4-story building with a mezzanine above the first floor, with additional floors added between existing floors during May 2016. Level 1 contained a car showroom, the hotel lobby and the supermarket undergoing construction to become a restaurant. Level 2, originally a mezzanine level, contained the offices of the car showroom, level 3 contained the hotel's restaurant and a foot spa, and levels 4,5 and 6 were the hotel guest rooms, each floor containing 22 rooms. Level 7 was used for accommodation of hotel and car showroom workers. The roof contained a 40 sqm office used by the owner of the building, the lift motor room, 4 plastic water containers and one stainless steel water container.
Collapse
At 19:14 on 7 March 2020, the Xinjia Hotel suddenly collapsed. A witness said that he had heard a big bang from the external
tempered glass
Tempered or toughened glass is a type of safety glass processed by controlled thermal or chemical treatments to increase its strength compared with normal glass. Tempering puts the outer surfaces into compression and the interior into tensi ...
of the hotel. He then witnessed the whole building collapsing within a few seconds. An employee of the hotel stated construction work had been done to the structure's
foundation
Foundation may refer to:
* Foundation (nonprofit), a type of charitable organization
** Foundation (United States law), a type of charitable organization in the U.S.
** Private foundation, a charitable organization that, while serving a good cause ...
.
Rescue
About 70 people were trapped in the collapsed hotel.
After the collapse, Fujian Fire Brigade sent 26 fire engines and 147 firefighters to rescue the victims. 32 victims had been rescued by 21:50 that day. At 22:14, Putian Fire Brigade arrived at the hotel. At least 47 victims had been rescued by 8 March 2020. On 12 March 2020, all the 71 victims, including 29 dead bodies, were rescued.
Investigation
The police started an investigation concerning Mr. Yang, the proprietor of the hotel.
On 10 March 2020, Shang Yong, the vice-minister of the
Ministry of Emergency Management
The Ministry of Emergency Management () is a cabinet-level executive department of the State Council that is responsible for emergency management, work safety, and emergency rescue. It is the result of a merger from emergency management depar ...
, stated that this incident was relevant to the responsibility for safety in production, and he also stated that the incident would be investigated entirely and legal responsibilities would be pursued.
On 12 March 2020, the
State Council State Council may refer to:
Government
* State Council of the Republic of Korea, the national cabinet of South Korea, headed by the President
* State Council of the People's Republic of China, the national cabinet and chief administrative auth ...
announced establishing a team to investigate the collapse, and appointed Fu Jianhua as the team leader.
The results of the investigation, published in July 2020, revealed that the owners had in May 2016 had added floors within the building, adding a total of 2 extra floors, which raised the load on the building slightly past its limit at 52100 kN, 100 kN over the design limit. When converting a ground floor supermarket to a restaurant on 10 January 2020, 3 supporting columns were found to be seriously deformed, though due to the Chinese New Year, work had not yet commenced until 1 March, where 3 more columns were discovered to be deformed. The repair works commenced on 5 March, with works done on 5 columns leading up to the collapse, with one column yet to have been repaired. However, the investigation reveals that the welds were not close enough to the next floor, leaving too large gaps between the welds, resulting in the welds providing no additional support, and is concluded to have worsened the deformation of the columns, resulting in the collapse.
See also
*
COVID-19 pandemic in Fujian
References
{{COVID-19 pandemic in mainland China
2020 disasters in China
Building collapses in 2020
Building collapses in China
Coordinates not on Wikidata
COVID-19 pandemic in mainland China
Disasters in hotels
History of Fujian
March 2020 events in China
Quanzhou