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| February 11, 2009 | (Use j/k keys to navigate)  Email to a friend  Permalink |
China's Lantern Festival, and an unfortunate ending
Marking the end of the Chinese New Year, the Lantern Festival takes place on the 15th day of the year - during the first full moon. People across Mainland China and Taiwan celebrate the festival in many colorful ways, from fiery folk traditions to firework displays and laser shows. Unfortunately, this year's festival ended on a somewhat sour note as an unauthorized fireworks show set an unoccupied skyscraper on fire in downtown Beijing, and one firefighter lost his life fighting the blaze. Collected here are 27 photos of the festival, and a handful from the Mandarin Oriental Hotel fire in Beijing. (27 photos total)
A folk stuntman sprays molten iron against a concrete wall to celebrate the Lantern Festival in Nuanquan town of Yuxian County, Hebei province February 8, 2009. For over 300 years, the village has carried out the tradition of spraying molten iron at 1,300° C (2,372° F) against a cold concrete wall to form sparks like fireworks during Lantern Festival, local media reported. (REUTERS/Jason Lee) #
People light and hold sky lanterns, readying them for release, to celebrate the traditional Chinese Sky Lantern Festival in Pingsi, Taipei County, Taiwan on February 7, 2009. Believers from Taiwan, Japan and Thailand gathered on Saturday to release sky lanterns as a form of prayer for good luck and blessings. (REUTERS/Nicky Loh) #
Sky lanterns float into the night during the Chinese Sky Lantern Festival in Pingsi, Taiwan on February 7, 2009. According to the elders of Pingsi, the tradition of releasing lanterns began during the Ching Dynasty when bands of outlaws frequently raided villages around Pingsi, forcing local residents to seek refuge in the mountains. The lanterns were signals used by the village watchmen to inform the refugees that their houses were safe again. (REUTERS/Nicky Loh) #
A building in the new China Central Television (CCTV) complex, still under construction, is seen on fire in Beijing February 9, 2009. The fire, started inadvertently by an unofficial fireworks display for the Lantern Festival staged by CCTV officials, destroyed the unoccupied building, designed by Rem Koolhaas, which was meant to house the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. (REUTERS/China Daily). #
Firemen prepare to fight a fire at a building that would have housed the soon-to-be-opened Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Beijing February 9, 2009. One person was killed in the fire, firefighter Zhang Jianyong, age 30. He was among the first on the scene and died from smoke inhalation. (REUTERS/Paul Zhang) #
More links and information
Lantern Festival - Wikipedia entry
Fire Ravages Renowned Building in Beijing - NYTimes.com 2/9
Fireworks and fire at the CCTV complex - YouTube video
This blogger might want to review your comment before posting it.
Beautiful 'till #21, Sad for the rest.
Wow that fire was huge, but the building doesn't look badly damaged in the aftermath photos.
#27 n1
Impressive fireworks...
#1 and 6 are simply outstanding.
wow, how horrible of a loss during what should be a happy holiday
Awesome as alwas!
So much for the good luck!
"It is unfortunate that the building was consumed by flames. Good thing that the steel didn't melt and the whole thing collapsed, though..."
"amazing picture and an unfortunate ending indeed. It is amazing no one was hurt, nothing else burned and that it didn't collapse."
"Wow that fire was huge, but the building doesn't look badly damaged in the aftermath photos."
i think this is one more indication that WTC was a controlled demolition. google WTC7. there was little fire on some floors and it came down... no way this was caused by fire.
If somebody still thinks that a fire could bring down a skyscraper then look first at pictures 22,23,24 and then 27.
Awesome pictures anyway!
I read that authorities in China banned almost all information about the building in fire. Hopefully the won't block the access to this amazing pictures.
PS: #14 and #15 are the best!
Striking contrast in picture #8.
#24 is breathtaking.
Oh, and WTC Kooks, it's a good thing that the Madarin Hotel didn't have burning JET FUEL in it...
Amazing pictures, as usual.
Hans - Let me guess, you don't think we ever went to the moon either, huh?
24 looks like nebula pic from Hubble
Suggesting this event proves or disproves anything about the WTC events is fundamentally poor reasoning. Even superficially, the CCTV building was substantially shorter than any of the WTC buildings, had a proportionally larger base, and a different style of construction. Also, the building is being considered destroyed, because fire damage to the metal structure has left the building irrecoverable.
I bet the building was totaled because it wasn't completely sealed and didn't yet have a working fire suppression system. Had it been occupied, it probably wouldn't have caught fire, and if it did, the fire probably could have been put out quickly, with no loss of life.
great pictures, good work, colors, pls, continue with good job! Thank you so much!
Lovely photos, but Xi'an is in Shaanxi Province, not neighboring Shanxi Province. That city wall in the first picture is wide enough for ten chariots.
A rather large "oops" on the hotel building. I find it odd that in China, the English name of the building is above the Chinese name...
and America is too paralyzed by political correctness to make English the official language.
This is one of millions of examples that English is the international language of business; why is the US so fearful of actually having it as our official language?
#24 is Amazing Photo. It looks like somthing that was rendered by ILM for some big budget movie! WOW!
Do caralho!
Thanks to whomever shared these pictures. Beijing is much changed since I was there 8 years ago. I had heard about the fire but could not comprehend the seriousness until seeing these photos. Fantastic photography... Thom
Superb photographs ... such a shame that the new moon was under the clouds where I live ...
By the way, Chinese building techniques are increadibly more resistant than US's ones, as demonstrated by the WTC7 collapse ...
"Buy sturdy, buy chinese", Or is there another story ?
Kind of like an Ox in a China shop!!!
amazing pictures, iron is awsome...
sidenote-thats what it looks like when a skyscraper burns and doesn't have explosives in the basement. hmmmmmmm
Why are pictures from Taiwan included? Thought this article was just about China's lantern festival?
As for the WTC nonsense: If you look at picture 26, you can see considerable damage to the steel structure, which could lead to potential collapse. Now, add a large metal object crashing into it, plus several thousands gallons of additional fuel, and you might have recreated the event. Remember, that you don't have to take down the whole building, just the supporting structure for one floor. One floor collapsing, with the weight of all the above floors, and you have a cascade failure.
What surprised me was how long it took for the WTC's to collapse.
Still, it's tragic losing the building for an otherwise beautiful event.
you guys keep saying "thank god no one got hurt." Hello...a firefighter died.
love #6
Photo #12 cannot possibly be on the grounds of Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall. It's likely Sun Yat-sen memorial Hall, which is much closer to Taipei 101.
Funny how no matter what the subject matter is, somehow people always manage to turn it into a political debate.
Give it a rest for 5 minutes and enjoy the fireworks (so to speak).
Outstanding photos as always.
Chinese lightning?
The top of #24 reminds me of the advent calendar galaxy's post. But this time, it's happening on earth.
Taiwan and China may share the same holiday, but don't mean that celebration photos in Taiwan should be included in the title of **China's** Lantern Festival.
you must be a pyromaniac. lots of fire in this blog ;)
Great pictures of an amazing celebration. My heartfelt condolences to the family of Zhang Jianyong. Firefighters around the world brave dangers every day for the rest of us and I, for one, am thankful to them all.
great job！you showed us the pictures of big fire that never displayed on Chinese official site.
As always, great photos from a fabulous site.
My apologies to everyone, but I must go off topic here and quickly deal with the 9-11 nonsense mentioned here. WTC7 and the Towers were NOT controlled demolition. For some accurate background to answer this and other questions, I would suggest looking at 911myths.com and screwloosechange.blogspot. Both are excellent resources for this garbage. Again, sorry for the off topic post.
This is an awesome site.
Although Taiwan and China celebrate the same holiday..BUT !
Since the title is "China's Lantern Festival, and an unfortunate ending", including photos where in Taiwan are irrelevant.
This year, the Festvial is not so pageten as before,the economic crisis thing.
but,if you were here in any city or villiage in China,you will feel the real festival.The nights were lit up.
Besides,I support #64.
Taiwan and China share more than just the same holiday, also the name **China** as in Republic of China.
Amazing All the money in the world and not any pennys for a sprinkler system....Which would have put the fire out ....... And did M.C. Eacher design the building in front of the burned one ? It is a bit strange looking .
Hi Alan are you have pictures in Changnyeong, South Korean fire festival ?
http://www.taiwannews.com.tw/etn/news_content.php?id=861397&lang=eng_news&cate_img=logo_world&cate_rss=WORLD_eng
thank's
Thank you CCTV! You burnt the whole building for the people to enjoy the festival. That was the most wonderful show of CCTV ever.
That is a giant McFriggin fire. Quite surprising it went down like that.
Man, this is a great, i mean GREAT story!
Incredible images. Congratulations
Aww... no I wish I lived in a bigger Chinese city...
thats how fire works. (pun intended)
awesome pictures, as always.
"44.I read that authorities in China banned almost all information about the building in fire. Hopefully the won't block the access to this amazing pictures. "
I can see them. I am in china. :)
#18 really has a beautiful explosion of colour - it should be used for testing new monitors...
i couldn't resist... # 11.. devil children with horns...
For those commenting about the fire in the building, remember that the building was under construction. It was not yet fireproofed which is probably in large part the reason why it went up like it did.
Great photos!
It is not Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in photo #12. It's Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall.
according to the architects, since the buiding is unfinished they hadn't pumped water into the sprinkler system, which would've for sure stopped the blaze.
this is rem koolhaus's own WTC dream come ture- i'm sure he will publish about 5 books about this!
By the way, the photo #27 was taken from the roof of a factory in Chaoyang district, I believe. The factory itself is quite picturesque, like: http://kitagor.com/2008/10/16/hm/
After the fire this hotel turned into a sightseeing plcae, sigh.
And the way the building after the fire is slouching, and that the metal is fatigued also proves that we never landed on the moon. You see, the flame coming out of the bottom of a rocket would melt everything around it, destroying the launch pad, and the rocket itself... based on this one fire in China, that melted the hotel's steel.
In fact, I think that NASA fake's everything they've ever done!*
(Sarcasm... the whole thing... in case people don't get it)
very impressive photos. shame someone died.
@ Dave: steel can't melt at the temperatures there even with such a big fire.
I find some of the people's comments regarding China and Taiwan utterly ignorant, if not offensive. Of course China's Lantern Festival should include Taiwan. Taiwan was, is and will always be part of China. China has been divided since 1949 because of the stupid cold war fight between communism and capitalism. But just because people fell for ideological differences does not mean they are not one people. That would be like saying Republicans and Democrats cannot both be Americans. Hello, Bushism? Hello Rovism?
Does anyone happen to see Gorzirra in the building fire picture? he's on top of course, just amazing that they actually got a picture of that elusive badass!
I love these types of pictures. Their cutoms and celebrations are so colorful and vibrant. Thank you for sharing. I love this site.
Beautiful stuff.
China always want to be different, new ideas, gotta think "BIG"
This year not only fireworks; plus featuring burning a building - and not just any buidling!!
@56: The building was designed by a Dutch architect named Rem Koolhaas, actually.
I am Chinese. I heard a firefighter was killed by poisonous smoke in the CCTV fire. The killer is CCTV! Shame on CCTV!
Pray
nice photos!
and the bigest fireworks in the end.
why?
Amazing pics!!
Good selection. #14 and #15 are great.
@98£ºShame On You
>14
biggest lantern wwww
the latest pics look like the movie WAR OF THE MACHINE scenario
@97: just like most of China export products, dessigned by western importing designeres and made in China; Western designer took 99% of the profit margin while the Chinese worker got the remaining 1% profit by draining the natrual resource. When products failed, we blamed the Chinese maker, not the western designer.
The bured building didn't collapse, must be the credit of the western designer, not Chinese maker.
Even the most liberal fire codes in most parts of the world would prevent such a disaster. The architect who builds abroad should know better. It is our professional responsibility to design safe buildings. This is why architecture is not art. The beauty of art is that is serves no one but the artist. Architecture has another responsibility, the safety of those who inhabit the space. It is a shame to see progress at the cost of so many lives.
The postal service in gothenburg came up with a bright idea.. to shoot fireworks indoor with the fire alarm turned off..
bojedisninasaw11/9...your an idiot and a coward if you believe that the towers and 'ol #7 were "melted to the point of collapse"...any one that thinks different, go ahead and look at yourself in the mirror and say " i don't know what i am talking about, I am living in denial in a cowardly fashion"...
I find some of the people's comments regarding China and Taiwan utterly ignorant, if not offensive. Of course China's Lantern Festival should not include Taiwan. Taiwan has never been part of PRC. PRC and ROC were established during the 1940s because of the stupid cold war fight between communism and capitalism. But just because people fell for ethnic similarities does not mean they are the same people. That would be like saying British and American are all British. Hello, Bushism? Hello Rovism?
hmmm... anyone tells me the official name of Taiwan? dont know? google it. Err... What? Republic of China? There must be some reason they call it China too.
and for those who said you didnt see the fired building pics in China, i would say plz learn some Chinese, and then you can read a Chinese web site.
and for those who knew everything, but just wanna post some distorted/manipulated/wrong information to lead misunderstandings between China and Westerns, F off.
Sorry for typing the above.
btw, good pictures.
as for all the WTC Stuff remember this is a building built after the analysis of the WTC fire failures. I'm sure the fire proofing on the steel was more stubstantial and the fire was probobly not as intense (the building was empty and had fewer fuel sources for fire.
Loved #14....... Too bad the building burned.... Any news How??? And i am suprised it buned the whole building down... hmmm.... leaves a lot for speculation.....
Wow, the maggots that are the 9/11 twoof have infested even this article.
Anyway, what a loss for the Chinese. Just terrible.
No.20
The province name is Shaanxi. Shanxi is the name of another province.
Beautiful composition and colors. Great images!!
such beautiful pictures,I love lantern festival but unfortunately i stuck in Toronto couldn't make it back to China
the building caught by fire is sad but fortunately nobody in there, sorry for the dead fireman who's trying to save other people's life
Hi there. I'm a Chinese. Thanks a lot for all of your comments and I'm very happy to read those friendly words.
By the way, what comment#44 said is not true. There is no news can be blocked in China currently and citizens are well-informed and willing to discuss all the issues, excting or disappointing.
I'm in China but seeing the picture it reminds to me that I was obviously on the wrong time at the wrong places. =) photograph nr. 14 is so amazing!!! best.
Great shoots~
Most High Rise construction in China and Taiwan uses Bamboo as the primary material for the external scaffolding supporting the workers as the interior and exterior components are assembled.
I have personally seen these Green Bamboo Scaffolds stretch upwards of 100 stories in Hong Kong and Quangdong. If this structure was truly near completion, this "wooden" exterior surface must have proved an abundant fuel source, allowing the spectacular flames we see on all sides in these remarkable pictures. The loss of life is truely regrettable.
I will not comment on the incredible ignorance of the WTC Hoax Folks.
I'm very impressed by these pictures....
I *love* the 9/11 conspiracy goons - so entertaining!
Hey guys, don't you think that a skyscraper built more than 35 years ago just *might* be a tad less stable than a skyscraper built today, with all the technological advances that have been made in architecture, materials science, etc., in the intervening years? And don't you think that just *perhaps* a wide-body airliner full of jet fuel slamming into that 35-year-old skyscraper at 400+ knots might be just a *little* different than a modern skyscraper burning up over the course of several hours with only the contents of the building for the fire's fuel?
Educate yourselves, seriously!
God and Saint Florian Bless Brother firefighter Zhang Jianyong and his family, No matter where in the world, we are there to protect people, and some of us do not come home.
i wouldn't put it past the chinese government to release "official" reports claiming no one was in the building.
color me skeptical.
other than that, any type of festival is nice to see - thank you for bringing these glimpses of life and culture into our respective homes and workplaces.
Very nice site!
i am doing a project in school on this festival, qand i need to know relevant information about it, every little thing such as the origin and such, if you know abnout this please contact me at Sapphire3450@yahoo.com.
thanks
~SAPPHY~
42. "i think this is one more indication that WTC was a controlled demolition."
Such an ignorant statement. I'm not going to get into the hours of writing it would take me to prove to you that it wasn't a controlled demolition, but I will say this.. The 2 main difference between the WTC towers that fell after burning and the building the burned in these pictures:
1) The WTC Towers had a jumbo jet fly into them at several hundred miles an hour. That JUST might have caused some structural damage and weakened the integrity of the buildings support structure.
2) The WTC Towers were built in the late 60's early 70's.. I would hope that nearly 40 years later, we would have developed some better fire resistance and structural integrity standards that hold up to a fire of that magnitude.
Stop trolling your anti-American ignorance through this site.
Ha, oops. I didn't notice that post 124 said basically the same thing.
I bookmarked this guestbook.,
Thank you,
good pictures