Toyota: 3 lines shut until Aug. 19 after explosion

Toyota Motor Corp. said three of its production lines in China will stay shut through Aug. 19 after last week’s blasts that rocked an industrial area in the port city of Tianjin.

Evacuation advisories in the area mean that none of the three lines at Tianjin FAW Toyota Motor Co. can operate, spokesman Itsuki Kurosu said in an e-mailed statement. A line at Xiqing, some 44 miles away, is shut because it needs parts produced at the Tianjin facility.

The death toll from Wednesday’s blasts at a chemical warehouse in Tianjin has risen to 112, while 95 people are still missing, Xinhua reported. Toyota previously said that about 50 employees who live in the surrounding were injured and that its staff suffered no deaths. Two Toyota dealerships were closed by the blasts, the company has said.

Toyota’s production wasn’t affected last week because the lines were closed for a public holiday, Kurosu said. The plant, called TEDA, started production in 2002 and as of 2011 employed 12,800 people making vehicles including the Corolla and RAV4, according to the company’s website.