Algerian gas plant explosion kills 23

Algerian state radio said nine people were missing since the blast, which occurred at 6:40 pm (1740 GMT) on Monday.

The minister for energy and mining, Chakib Khelil, told the radio after visiting the site that it was not yet possible to say what caused the blast. He also said it was unclear how many people were working in the area at the time and rescue workers were digging through the wreckage in case more bodies were buried there.

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President Abdelaziz Bouteflika interrupted a visit to Algeria's third largest city, Constantine, to go to the disaster site.

Khelil said the explosion destroyed three liquefaction units at the plant, a huge complex lying 500 kilometres (300 miles) east of the capital Algiers which produced 23 percent of the country's liquified natural gas (LNG).

Output would have to be stepped up at the Arzew complex, near Oran in western Algeria, which produced the other 77 percent, he said.

A foreman in a storage depot at the complex told the radio that he heard "strange noises and abnormal vibrations coming from a boiler and valves before the explosion."

A woman living close to the plant, about 10 kilometres (six miles) outside Skikda, said: "There was a heavy blast and everything started to shake and the windows of my apartment were blown out."

Speaking haltingly, she said the complex was engulfed in smoke and flames. "We all ran out, we helped the handicapped and the old people," she said, adding: "Many of them were in shock and the children were crying."

A local official, in charge of health in the Skikda region, told state radio that a fire at the plant had been brought under control early Tuesday after raging for almost eight hours.

Khelil said 26 people were still under observation in Skikda hospital but 43 others had been discharged after receiving treatment. Another five people were taken to hospital in Annaba, a port city about 100 kilometres further east.

The Skikda complex included six plants for processing gas and oil products and employs 12,000 people. It exported 15 million tonnes of LNG and oil products to Europe each year.

Unlike most other major petroleum exporters, which sell mostly crude oil, Algeria relies to a great extent on exports of gas, a cleaner and lighter energy source, for its foreign currency earnings.

The hydrocarbons sector brought in 24 billion dollars last year, or 96 percent of the country's export revenues, and natural gas and LNG accounted for more than half of that.