3 school employees detained after fatal stair crush

Police detained the head of a primary school and two of the school's staff members on Monday following an accident that killed six and injured 26 others in Yunnan province on Friday afternoon.

The government information office of Kunming, capital of Yunnan, said three employees of Mingtong Primary School — school principal Li Lan, deputy principal Yang Lin and physical education teacher Li Pengcheng — were in custody on suspicion of violating the Criminal Law for alleged neglect of educational facilities.

The Friday incident began after Li Pengcheng vertically propped two cotton cushions measuring 2 meters long, 1.5 meters wide and 30 cm high against a corner section of a school building's staircase. He had intended to use the cushions for one of his gym classes.

One of the cushions, however, slipped to the ground, blocking the stairway. After class let out, a few students walking ahead of a throng of classmates tripped and fell on the cushions. The throng, unaware that their classmates had fallen, then fell upon them, causing a crush of pupils on the stairs.

Most of the victims were in the first or second grades.

Mingtong Primary School was founded in 1955 and is regarded as one of the best schools in the area. After the incident, Kunming officials demanded that all schools in the city be thoroughly checked to remove any safety hazards.