Students killed in China school toilet stampede

Two children died and 20 others were injured during a stampede at an elementary school bathroom in central China on Wednesday, according to state media reports.

Students at the Number Three Experimental Primary School in Puyang were packed in a bathroom when others started pushing in. The injured students were hospitalized, some in serious condition, BBC reports, citing the Xinhua news agency.

A county official confirmed the deaths and injuries to the Associated Press, but declined to elaborate.

A parent of a student at the school posted on social media that the deadly stampede happened after panic erupted when a bathroom wall collapsed. The cause of the incident remains under investigation, the South China Morning Post reports.

China’s deadliest stampede in recent years happened in 2015, when 36 people died in a crush near Shanghai’s riverfront during New Year celebrations, according to the AP.

In 2014, six children died and 25 others were injured during a stampede on a school staircase in southwest China, BBC reports.

Video purportedly taken outside the school after the stampede shows distraught parents waiting to get word on the condition of the victims. Some relatives of the students collapsed outside the school, the video shows.