At least nine people were killed and four injured in a blast that flattened a three-storey residential building in south China, police said.
The blast occurred early on Saturday in Leye county of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, the official Xinhua news agency quoted.
Seven people were killed on the spot and two others succumbed to injuries in hospital. The four injured were being treated in a local hospital, police said.
Owner of the building, who only gave his surname Wang, was not inside it when the accident took place. Wang said that some rooms in the building were rented by nine lodgers.
Investigation into the cause of the accident was under way, the report said.
China has reported similar accidents in the past and most of them involved illegal firecracker production units, which functioned from homes, violating safety rules.