A major explosion incident occurred at the Huasheng Fireworks Company factory in Liuyang City, Changsha, Hunan Province, resulting in 89 casualties. After the accident, media personnel entering the factory premises discovered that almost all the workshop doors on the fireworks production lines were adorned with talismans praying for safety, sparking public attention.
On May 4th at around 4:40 pm, a particularly severe explosion took place in the production workshop of the Huasheng Fireworks Manufacturing and Display Co., Ltd. As of 12:00 pm on May 8th, the accident had claimed 37 lives, with 1 person missing and 51 individuals receiving medical treatment (including 5 in critical condition).
According to reports from mainland official media, after the disaster, entry into the factory premises, including the fireworks production workshops, revealed a surprising sight – almost all the doors of the fireworks production workshops were adorned with talismans. Zhou Zhiming, Secretary-General of the Liuyang Fireworks Association, stated that these talismans were put up by the factory and workers as a psychological belief, hoping for peace under the blessings of Bodhisattva.
The strong shockwave generated by the explosion severely destroyed the safety room, with walls crumbling and a clock frozen at the moment of the blast. Electric cars parked outside the factory gate were incinerated, leaving only the skeletal remains of the vehicles.
Nearly all the factory buildings at the site of the accident collapsed, littered with charred vehicle debris, and remnants of unburned packaging paper still smoking on some ruins, with electricity poles broken into several pieces.
Aerial footage shows a chaotic scene in the area where factory buildings intertwine with residential houses, multiple roofs torn off, and walls slanted and collapsed.
Within the factory were dozens of small workshops for loading and transporting fireworks, located a few hundred meters from the explosion’s epicenter. However, almost all the factory doors were destroyed, indicating the immense power of the explosion.
In the weighing workshop, strong oxidizing agent potassium chlorate was stored alongside reducing agents like silver powder, posing significant safety risks.
Despite the explosion occurring during the May Day holiday, many employees were present for work due to fulfilling export orders.
The impact wave swept through surrounding villages, shattering windows of buildings 1 kilometer away from the blast core, causing door frames and glass window frames to deform under the shockwave.
Compared to the devastation a few hundred meters away, another core area of the Huasheng Fireworks Factory still exhibited traces of its operations as a fireworks manufacturing enterprise.
Reports indicate that although the video surveillance room of the Liuyang Fireworks Industry is located in the Emergency Management Bureau of Liuyang City, requests to review playback videos of the explosion on May 4th were unsuccessful, as the responsible person mentioned that the monitoring system did not have cloud storage capabilities.
The surveillance room’s responsible person explained that the storage function was in the fireworks factory itself, and due to a power outage at the factory during the explosion, the monitoring room did not receive any signals. The platform’s capabilities are said to be at the level of over a decade ago.
Moreover, even if remote monitoring video operations ran smoothly, only around 8 companies could be randomly checked daily. Despite Liuyang having 431 fireworks companies with over 70,000 cameras in total, a single company would only be reviewed every approximately 3 months.
Established in the year 2000, the Huasheng Fireworks Manufacturing and Display Co., Ltd. is a well-established local fireworks company, covering an area of about 800 mu, equivalent to the size of 75 standard soccer fields. Public data from 2024 indicate a total production value of around 30 million, placing the enterprise at a medium to lower scale locally. Their products have a domestic market share of approximately 40% and an export share of 60%.
The incident factory is located along National Highway 354, with the factory gate on the left side and employee dormitories on the right side. The straight-line distance between the two points is approximately 200 meters, with most glass products in the dormitory buildings shattered.
In a room on the second floor, along with kitchenware, over 20 pieces of women’s clothing hung neatly, among which a striking white dress with black floral prints stood out. Near the dress, there was a card belonging to a factory worker in the “Effects Line.” She was listed as one of the severely injured in the accident.
According to acquaintances, the cardholder was born in 1985 and hailed from a town 16 kilometers away. Described as a versatile woman, she got married early, and her eldest son is now in his 20s and already working. “She switched from early childhood education to the fireworks factory only at the beginning of 2026. We received news on May 7th that due to her severe injuries, she passed away,” shared her friends.
Villagers approximately a kilometer away from the explosion site noted that there were more female workers at the factory, and apart from the management, all workers were on a “no basic salary but piece-rate wage” system.