Tata Motors may have lost 5,800 vehicles in Tianjin blast
21 Aug 2015
Jaguar Land Rover, the UK subsidiary of Tata Motors, today said the company must have lost around 5,800 cars in the fire that razed the Tiajin port city in China. JLR said it is in the process of assessing the impact of the Tianjin Port blast as access to the area is still restricted (See: China cracks down on chemical plants after blasts kill 56).
Tianjin Port is one of three major locations in China through which Jaguar Land Rover imports vehicles. At the time of the explosion, Tata Motors said in a statement, adding that approximately 5,800 vehicles that had recently been shipped to China were stored at various locations in Tianjin.
''However, access to facilities near the site of the explosion remains restricted and so whilst we believe many of these vehicles may have been damaged, we are presently unable to quantify the numbers of units affected,'' the company said.
''We will continue to monitor the situation and work to minimise the impact on our customers and the business,'' it added.
Meanwhile, the official Xinhua news agency on Friday reported four new fires that broke out close to the site where two massive explosions in a warehouse storing dangerous chemicals killed 114 people last week.
Xinhua said one of the "ignition points" came from within an automobile distribution area near the blast site and the other three were within the central blast area.
China is conducting an investigation on what caused the two huge explosions at the warehouse storing volatile chemicals at a busy port in northeast China.
The warehouse, designed to house dangerous and toxic chemicals, was storing mainly ammonium nitrate, potassium nitrate and calcium carbide at the time of the blasts, according to the police.
Jaguar Land Rover expressed condolences to the families and friends of those who lost loved ones in the explosions in Tianjin. ''Our thoughts are with them as well as with all those who were injured in this tragic event,'' it said.
