( CNN ) -- Sixteen people have been killed and five others injured in a fire early Wednesday at a market in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen , the local government said . About 145 firefighters worked to extinguish the blaze , which charred an area of more than 1,000 square meters ( 10,800 square feet ) , the local government said in a post on Weibo , a Twitter-like service in China . The blaze started around 1 a.m. Wednesday , the state news agency Xinhua reported . Later in the morning , firefighters were still clearing away the embers and searching for survivors in the debris , the agency said . There was no immediate mention of the cause of the fire . The Rongjian Farmers ' Market is a venue for farm produce wholesalers in Gongming New District of Shenzhen , according to Xinhua .
The fire at a wholesale farm produce market burned more than 1,000 square meters . About 145 firefighters battled to extinguish the blaze , which began early Wednesday . A total of 1,150 people were evacuated from their homes in the area and some 200 cars were destroyed by flames that spread quickly through the city center.