One died and 16 were injured in gas leak explosions at the construction site of an underground passage in Shenzhen's Futian District on Thursday.

A series of explosions were heard within three minutes around 12:10 a.m. at the passage at the crossing of Huafu Road and Shennan Road Central.

Construction worker error was blamed for the gas leak.

A woman pedestrian died at hospital and another passer-by was in serious condition while the other 15 injured were in stable condition, hospitals said Thursday.

A witness surnamed Li was at the nearest bus stop to the site at the time of explosions.

He said he saw three fire engines approaching the construction site and then there were a series of three explosions within 15 seconds after the engines stopped.

Thousands of residents were woken up by the noise. The window glass of some of the buildings nearby was destroyed by the blast wave.

The power supply to nearby residential communities and business complexes was cut off immediately after the explosion, which involved some 7,000 residents and cost about 5.3 million yuan (US$636,000).

By 6 a.m. Thursday, the gas leak had stopped and traffic in the area went back to normal. Electricity supply to the area is expected to resume Friday noon.

A gas station located less than 20 meters from the explosion spot was unaffected by the explosions but had been closed until recently.

However, some residents nearby said the gas station shouldn't be located in such a busy downtown area.

Source: Shenzhen Daily