One fire fighter died and 28 others were injured in a forest fire that broke out Tuesday afternoon in Xingzi County, east China's Jiangxi Province, said local sources.

The dead was a 22-year-old armed police soldier named Tan Shouwen. He was found unconscious at the scene of the fire Tuesday night and died in the hospital later that night.

All of the injured, mostly soldiers, have been hospitalized, said the local sources.

With fire being still out of control, 11 teams of fire fighters have been mobilized from other parts of the province, said sources from Jiangxi Provincial Forest Fire Control Headquarters.

In the meantime, fire control forces in Xingzi County have been cutting shrubs to create an isolation zone to prevent the fire from spreading to Mount Lushan, a famous summer resort.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

(Xinhua News Agency March 11, 2004)