Fourteen people were killed and five injured Sunday in an explosion at a fireworks factory in Thailand's ancient capital Ayuthaya, officials and witnesses said.
The blast destroyed the factory that officials revealed had not had a licence to produce fireworks for 10 years and police blamed "carelessness" for the blast.
All the dead and injured were from the Boon-Leur factory in Ayuthaya, just north of the Thai capital Bangkok, but the blast at 3:00 pm (0800 GMT) also damaged nearby houses, according to officials and witnesses.
Police said the intensity of the blast was making it hard to identify the victims, but that at least seven were men and three were women. Thai television showed images of a completely flattened building amid fields littered with charred debris from what appeared to have been an enormous explosion.
"What we do know is this factory's license ran out 10 years ago and it was illegally producing fireworks," Kamnueng Isaro, a district official, told state radio.
Prasith Thotawin, who lived nearby, said he rushed to the site when he heard the loud blast and help comfort the injured, according to the online news outlet Manager.
The man said he had found four youths aged between 13 and 15 with severe skin burns and helped them get to a nearby hospital.
The factory had moved to its most recent site from across the road a decade ago after the original building was also destroyed in a similar accident, said Ayuthaya's deputy director of Industrial Works, Prasert Tapineeyanguru.
He said the owner of the factory, Boon-Leur Imsuwan, could face up to two years in jail for operating the illegal factory, but did not indicate if that sentence would be increased because of the high number of deaths resulting from the blast.
Police said they suspected the accident may have been the result of increased fireworks production at the factory to complete orders ahead of the kingdom's Loi Krathong festival.
Ayuthaya police spokesman Wanchai Tanadkit said the blast destroyed the 200 square-metre building housing the fireworks operation.
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