Fireworks factory blast kills 13 in southern India
In the second such incident in the country in recent days, an explosion at a fireworks factory in the southern Indian state of Kerala, killed at least 13 people and injured more than 40 on April 21, 2026, Deccan Herald reported.
The factory where the blast happened was a temporary production facility and was making firecrackers for the locally important Thrissur Pooram festival.
The blast occurred roughly around 3:30pm local time with a substantial number of the workforce present in the factory during the disaster and thus becoming its casualties.
The fire was not limited to the initial explosion as several secondary ones reportedly kept complicating rescue efforts, as well as the factory's remote location near rural agricultural fields with paddy crops in the way, in conjunction with sparse road connectivity limited the speed with which authorities and local emergency services such as the fire department could respond with specialised equipment.
The recovered bodies of the victims were put through DNA testing as they had become unrecognisable after being severely burned. Several of the injured pulled from the fire were also reportedly in critical condition in local medical facilities.
Purportedly the facility was operated by the Thiruvambady temple committee, one of the two principal participants in the festival's celebrated fireworks displays. However it is unclear to what level the facility was regulated by local authorities and how strict the safety norms and practices were in its day to day operations.
As is often the case with major accidents and disasters, India's central government announced ex-gratia payments of INR200,000 ($2,144) to families of the deceased and INR50,000 to the injured from India's Prime Minister's National Relief Fund. However, away from the pattern for similarly sized incidents, Kerala's state government declared the incident a state disaster and sanctioned INR50mn for immediate relief through the Thrissur District Collectorate, and ordered a judicial probe under a one-member commission.
The Kerala State Police also reportedly constituted a Special Investigation Team(SIT) under the Thrissur City Police Commissioner, with the exact cause of the blast to be determined. The accident followed a fatal explosion at another fireworks manufacturing facility in another southern state of India Tamil Nadu just days earlier, thus making the Kerala blast the second such incident within a week.
Firework manufacturing is regulated by both the central and state governments in India and routinely inspected for safety practices by local law enforcement, however low wages, corruption and the use of informal setups, banned and highly volatile chemicals such as potassium chlorate make it one of the most risky enterprises in the country.
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