Update, Monday September 28: A team of Chinese specialists is to be brought in to assist the investigation, and the Chinese government is being formally notified through its embassy in Colombo. See Chinese specialists to join the inquiry below.
A hospital health care assistant has died of injuries sustained in the gas explosion at the Polonnaruwa kidney hospital, Hiru News reported on Saturday afternoon, citing hospital sources. Police confirmed the dead man was a health care assistant. He had been admitted in serious condition after the pre-dawn blast.
In a later report, Hiru said the man was 34, a father of one, and a resident of the Hatharaskotuwa area in Gal Oya. Three of the injured remain in intensive care. He is not named in any report we could verify.
The Daily Mirror gives his age as 36 and his home as the Habarana area in a report published on Saturday evening, citing police — a different age and a different locality from Hiru’s account. Ada Derana’s earlier report of the death, which we could not retrieve directly, was also indexed as giving the age as 36. The differences are set out below; we have not been able to resolve them.
| Detail | Hiru News | Daily Mirror |
|---|---|---|
| Age | 34 | 36 |
| Home area | Hatharaskotuwa, Gal Oya | Habarana |
| Status of the injured | Two hospital workers, a security officer and two civilians | All seven described as hospital employees |
Seven hospital employees were injured in the explosion in the kitchen of the Polonnaruwa kidney hospital at about 4.30 a.m. on Saturday, police said. Two of the injured are in critical condition, Hiru News reported earlier.
All seven were admitted to Polonnaruwa’s main state hospital for treatment. The building housing the hospital kitchen sustained severe damage, Hiru reported — a claim borne out by images from the scene showing a collapsed ceiling, structural columns stripped bare and debris scattered across a police-taped cordon. The Daily Mirror has since carried the same assessment from police, reporting that the blast caused extensive damage to hospital buildings and other property.
Police have not determined what caused the gas leak that led to the explosion and are continuing investigations, the Daily Mirror reported.
Chinese specialists to join the inquiry
A team of Chinese professionals is expected to be brought in to assist the investigation, Director General of Health Services Dr Asela Gunawardena said on Monday, NewsFirst reported. Arrangements are also being made to inform the Chinese government about the explosion through the Chinese Embassy in Sri Lanka.
The involvement is less surprising than it first appears. The facility is formally the China–Sri Lanka Friendship National Nephrology Specialized Hospital: it was built as an outright grant from the Chinese government, under an RMB 460 million agreement signed in 2016 following a request made in Beijing the previous year, and declared open in June 2021 as the largest specialised kidney hospital in South Asia. The party being asked to help examine the installation is, in effect, the party that built it.
Neither NewsFirst nor any other outlet we could find says how many specialists are coming, when they are expected, which Chinese institution they represent, or what part of the inquiry they will take on — whether the kitchen’s gas installation specifically, or the building more broadly. Nor does any report say whether the request originated with the Health Ministry, the hospital or the Chinese side.
Two disputed details settle further
NewsFirst’s Monday report does not present itself as a correction, but it lands on one side of two questions that have been open since Saturday.
| Question | Monday’s report |
|---|---|
| Time of the blast | ”around 4 a.m.” — with Hiru’s later figure, against the 4.30 a.m. of the first accounts |
| Were civilians among the injured? | ”Seven hospital employees were injured… one of those in critical condition later died” — with the Daily Mirror, against Hiru’s count of two civilians |
That phrasing also confirms the arithmetic of the casualty count: the seven are the total, the man who died is one of them, and one dead plus six injured is the same seven people — not an eighth casualty.
The deceased is again given as a 36-year-old resident of Habarana. That is now the fourth report to use those details, against Hiru’s single account of a 34-year-old from Hatharaskotuwa. He is still not named.
Police continue to attribute the blast to a suspected gas leak and, four days on, still do not say what failed.
Four investigations now under way
A five-member internal investigation committee has been appointed by the National Nephrology Hospital and has already begun work, the hospital’s director said on Sunday, NewsFirst reported.
It is one of four separate inquiries now running in parallel:
| Investigating body | Status |
|---|---|
| Hospital internal committee (five members) | Appointed; investigation commenced |
| Ministry of Health | Launched, announced by Minister Dr Nalinda Jayatissa |
| Sri Lanka Police (two teams) | Appointed Saturday |
| Government Analyst’s Department | Own investigation commenced |
To these four, Monday added an outside element rather than a fifth inquiry: the team of Chinese specialists described above is to assist the investigation, and no report assigns it an inquiry of its own or says which of the four it will work with.
The involvement of the Government Analyst’s Department is the significant addition. Its forensic examination of the kitchen installation is the route by which the unresolved cylinder-versus-pipeline question — on which the three outlets have contradicted each other since Saturday morning — is most likely to be settled.
Police continue to attribute the blast to a gas leak, without specifying the source.
The casualty count is now settled
NewsFirst’s Sunday report gives the toll as one dead and six injured — a total of seven, which reconciles with the “seven injured” reported by all three outlets on Saturday morning, one of whom later died. Hiru’s Saturday afternoon figure of one killed and five injured now stands as the outlier and appears simply to have been wrong.
| Account | Dead | Injured | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Saturday morning (DM, NF, Hiru) | 0 | 7 | 7 |
| Saturday afternoon (Hiru) | 1 | 5 | 6 |
| Sunday (NewsFirst) | 1 | 6 | 7 |
The dead man’s details
NewsFirst again gives the deceased as a 36-year-old resident of Habarana, matching the Daily Mirror. Two verified outlets have now given that account twice each, against Hiru’s single report of a 34-year-old from Hatharaskotuwa in Gal Oya. We treat 36 and Habarana as the better-supported account, while noting the disagreement is unacknowledged by any of the three. He is still not named.
Condition of the survivors
A hospital spokesperson said on Sunday that one of the injured remains in critical condition. Hiru had reported on Saturday afternoon that three were in intensive care. The reports are a day apart, so the figures are not necessarily in conflict, but no outlet describes any change in condition.
NewsFirst also places the injured at Polonnaruwa Teaching Hospital — the third name used for the receiving hospital across the coverage — and confirms that in-patients from the nephrology hospital were transferred to Polonnaruwa General Hospital.
Cylinder or pipeline — the accounts differ
The three outlets covering the explosion do not agree on what exploded.
| Outlet | Cause given |
|---|---|
| Daily Mirror | A gas cylinder in the kitchen |
| NewsFirst (first report) | A gas cylinder |
| NewsFirst (later report) | A gas pipe leak |
| Hiru News | The gas supply pipeline feeding the kitchen |
The distinction matters for the investigation — a failed cylinder and a failed fixed pipeline point to different faults and different responsibility — and no outlet reconciles the two accounts. NewsFirst changed sides during the morning without noting the change, attributing the blast to a suspected gas pipe leak in its second report. That leaves the Daily Mirror alone on the cylinder account.
The outlets also give three different names for the hospital the injured were taken to: Polonnaruwa General Hospital (Daily Mirror), Polonnaruwa District General Hospital (Hiru) and Polonnaruwa Teaching Hospital (NewsFirst). The facility that exploded is variously called the Polonnaruwa National Nephrology Hospital and the Polonnaruwa Kidney Hospital.
The earliest report of the death we have found is NewsFirst’s, timed 9:52 a.m. — under six hours after the blast — citing the hospital spokesperson. The Sinhala-language desks and Newswire followed around 11 a.m. Hiru’s Sinhala report again attributes the explosion to the gas supply pipeline feeding the kitchen, not a cylinder — the same split its English desk gave.
Two police teams appointed
Two police teams have been appointed to investigate the explosion, NewsFirst reported on Saturday morning. Police suspect a gas pipe leak caused the blast.
The same report says the explosion caused extensive damage to the hospital’s main kitchen and several surrounding buildings, and that patients under treatment were moved to Polonnaruwa General Hospital. Services were being maintained in part of the facility despite the disruption.
NewsFirst gives the dead man as a 36-year-old resident of Habarana — matching the Daily Mirror on both age and home area, and against Hiru’s account of a 34-year-old from Hatharaskotuwa in Gal Oya. Two verified outlets now stand on one side of that split and one on the other; none of the three acknowledges the disagreement.
On the condition of the survivors the reports still differ, though they were filed hours apart. NewsFirst said at 9:52 a.m. that one person remained in critical condition. Hiru said that afternoon that three were in intensive care.
Health Minister visits; casualty count revised down
Health and Media Minister Dr Nalinda Jayatissa travelled to Polonnaruwa on Saturday afternoon, visiting the injured at the general hospital before inspecting the damaged nephrology hospital, Hiru reported.
He offered the government’s condolences to the dead man’s family and said the state would provide “all necessary intervention and support”, adding that precautionary measures would be introduced to prevent similar accidents and that further steps would follow once the full extent of the damage was established.
Those present included Deputy Minister of Housing, Construction and Water Supply T. B. Sarath, MPs Sunil Rathnasiri and Padmasiri Bandara, National Nephrology Hospital director Dr Dilka Samarasinghe and Polonnaruwa General Hospital deputy director Dr Nihal Gunathilaka. A meeting was held with hospital authorities on keeping patient services running.
Hiru also said in-house patients are being transferred to Polonnaruwa General Hospital as needed, while some operations at the nephrology hospital continue uninterrupted despite the damage.
Two figures in the later report differ from the morning accounts:
| Detail | Morning reports | Saturday afternoon (Hiru) |
|---|---|---|
| Casualties | Seven injured | One killed, five injured |
| Time of blast | About 4.30 a.m. | About 4.00 a.m. |
Hiru’s later report also breaks the injured down as two other hospital workers, a security officer and two civilians — the first indication that people other than staff were caught in the blast. It attributes the explosion to a suspected gas leak in the main kitchen, and says the blast damaged adjacent healthcare buildings as well as the kitchen.
Not reported
The dead man is still not named in any report we could verify, and his age and home area remain formally disputed, though two verified outlets have now each given 36 and Habarana twice, against Hiru’s single account of 34 and Gal Oya.
No outlet describes the nature of the injuries, says whether the gas installation had been inspected or when it was last serviced, or gives a cost estimate for the damage. None reconciles the two times given for the blast (about 4.00 a.m. and about 4.30 a.m.), and none acknowledges its own or another outlet’s corrections.
Whether any of the injured were members of the public remains unsettled — Hiru counts two civilians among them, the Daily Mirror describes all seven as hospital employees, and NewsFirst’s Sunday report does not break the six down at all.
The cylinder-versus-pipeline question remains open. Police and the later reports refer only to “a gas leak” in the kitchen without settling which failed. Nothing has been published on the terms of reference, membership or reporting deadline of any of the four investigations, and no date has been given for when any of them will report.
Sources
- Seven injured in gas cylinder explosion at Polonnaruwa Nephrology Hospital — Daily Mirror, September 26
- Seven injured in gas pipeline explosion at Polonnaruwa Kidney Hospital — Hiru News, September 26
- Seven Injured in Gas Cylinder Explosion at Polonnaruwa Kidney Hospital — NewsFirst, September 26
- Hospital employee injured in gas pipe explosion at Polonnaruwa Kidney Hospital dies — Hiru News (Sinhala), September 26
- Hospital worker dies after explosion at Polonnaruwa Nephrology Hospital — Newswire, September 26
- Government will provide all necessary support following Polonnaruwa Hospital blast, says Nalinda — Hiru News, September 26
- 36-year-old dies following gas cylinder explosion at Polonnaruwa Kidney Hospital — Daily Mirror, September 26
- Two Police Teams Probe Polonnaruwa Hospital Explosion — NewsFirst, September 26
- Committee Appointed To Probe Into Explosion At Nephrology Hospital In Polonnaruwa — NewsFirst, September 27
- Chinese Team to Assist Probe into Polonnaruwa Nephrology Hospital Explosion — NewsFirst, September 28
