More than 4,000 students were affected when classes were
suspended in their schools following?a gas leak in Gaoqiao
Town of Kaixian County, southwest China's Chongqing Municipality, said an official with
the local government.
Three schools near the site of the leak were closed and another
three used to house evacuees, said Jiang Bocheng, head of the
Kaixian Education Committee.
None of the students from the six primary and high schools in
the town were affected by the leak, added Jiang.
"The school authorities took timely emergency measures to
evacuate students and suspend classes after the incident," he
said.
"We will try our best to resume classes for third graders in
junior high school by Wednesday as they will take senior high
school entrance exams soon," he said.
"Time to resume lessons for other students will be determined by
when the incident is completely over," he added.
More than 10,000 residents living within a kilometer of the leak
were evacuated and measures to cap it are still ongoing.
Local government workers are monitoring the air and water
quality within one kilometer of the leak and reporting the results
every hour. No water or air pollution has been reported.
The leak was discovered at the well belonging to the China
National Petroleum Corporation's Sichuan Provincial Petroleum
Administration Saturday morning. There have been no reports of
casualties.
The gas well is within the vicinity of the Luojia No.16H Gas
Well where a deadly gas blowout killed 243 people on Dec. 23,
2003.
Ma Fucai, then CNPC's general manager, resigned in April 2004
for his negligence in security measures that led to the deadly
accident.
(Xinhua News Agency March 28, 2006)