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Death toll from Taiwan golf ball factory fire rises to nine.

TAIPEI: The death toll from a fire at a golf ball factory in southern Taiwan over the weekend has risen to at least nine.

They include four firefighters who died in an explosion, officials said on Monday (Sep 25).

The fire, which began on Friday evening and raged all night, also injured more than 100 people, mostly workers in the factory in Pingtung county, according to the local government.

One person was still listed as missing as further testing was required to verify the identity of body fragments found at the scene, a county official told AFP.

Taiwan’s Central News Agency, quoting a Pingtung County fire official, said an explosion caused part of the building to collapse at about 6.10pm on Friday, trapping firefighters and workers under rubble. A second explosion followed 20 minutes later.

The cause of the fire remained unclear.

A fire department official told local media on Saturday that chemical peroxide stored inside the factory could have been the cause of the one large and several smaller explosions.

President Tsai Ing-wen and other top officials visited the scene on Saturday to express condolences to the victims’ families and vowed to investigate the cause of the fire.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/taiwan-golf-ball-factory-fire-pingtung-firefighters-dead-injured-workers-3796151