At least 32 workers were confirmed dead and two others injured on Wednesday morning in a steel plant accident in northeast China's Liaoning Province, local work safety authorities said.

The accident occurred at 7:45 AM in a Qinghe Special Steel Corporation workshop in Tieling City when a steel ladle -- used for pouring molten steel -- suddenly sheared off from the iron rail linking it to the blast furnace.

The ladle was moving into pouring position above a worktable when it fell, spewing out white-hot molten metal at around 1,500 degrees Celsius into a room where workers had gathered as they changed shift. The liquid metal engulfed the room, bursting through the door and windows and burying the workers.

Work safety officials who rushed to the site said that the bodies of 32 workers have been recovered and the injured have been taken to hospital.

The cause of the accident is being investigated.

(Xinhua News Agency April 18, 2007)