Asia's tallest wooden tower
Fire engulfs a 16-story wooden tower at Jiulong Town on December 10, 2017 in Deyang, Sichuan Province of China. A huge blaze has engulfed and destroyed a 16-story wooden tower, known as the tallest of its kind in Asia, after a fire, starting at the Lingguan Mansion, raged through a monastery in Sichuan Province, southwest China.VCG/VCG via Getty Images

A massive fire engulfed Asia's tallest wooden tower, Lingguan Tower, which is located in China. The 16-storey Buddhist wooden pagoda and a prayer hall at the Lingguan Mansion complex in Southwestern China got reduced to rubble on Sunday in a mystery blaze.

The fires at the Lingguan Tower, which is known as Asia's tallest wooden pagoda, started at about 12.40 pm from the top and quickly spread to the bottom, the local government said on the Chinese social media platform Weibo.

The firefighters managed to put out the flames only after four hours and by that time the wooden pagoda was completely destroyed. Authorities said that there were no reports of causalities. The Mianzhu officials are investigating the cause of the fire and also looking up for measurements to prevent such major incidents from taking place.

Photos and videos, which were shared on Weibo on Sunday, showed the 16-storey pagoda engulfed in bright flames and black smoke. The fire also destroyed the Hall of Arhan and the Main Hall and burned an area of around 800 square metres, People's Daily Online reported.

The Lingguan Mansion pagoda was first built during the Ming Dynasty (1368 to 1644 AD) in China under the reign of Chongzhen Emperor, whose real name was Zhu Youjian. The pagoda was destroyed in 2008 after an 8.0 magnitude powerful earthquake, which was named Sichuan earthquake, shook China.

The temple was restored in 2010, but construction work was still going on when the fire destroyed the entire complex. The tower is located around seven kilometres (4.3 miles) outside of Mianzhu city, Sichuan province in Southwest China.

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