Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Wow, thats a huge explosion.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

To me, that looks like a flour dust explosion.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Looks like a Big Bang with accompanying pressure wave followed by Hezbollah saying, “Bugger there goes all our rockets”, And immediate denial of all knowledge from Israel.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Both my dad and I saw this and went "Fuff".

---------- Post added at 22:38 ---------- Previous post was at 22:12 ----------

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

That is an amazing, unbelievable, screw up.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Sadly the latest figures they have now are that there are 78 dead and more then 4,000 injured.:(

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-53659282

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Apparently the werehouse had 2,700 tons of Amonium Nitrate stored there that had been confiscated several uears earlier from a ship.

This chemical in its own right is not explosive ( It's an oxidising agent ) but if in combination with a flammable source, such as gas or oil, will facilitate an explosion.

From the pictures it looks like a fire was already in progress before the explosion so the flammable agent was there heating up the Nitrate.

See ANFO

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Sky reporting someone was welding in the building

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

I can hear how that job offer went.
The good news is we have a new highly paid welding job for you. The bad news is that it's next to the biggest stack of ammonium nitrate in the Middle East!

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

The explosion is reported to be approximately 1/5 the size of the Hiroshima nuclear bomb and the largest in peacetime.

The devastation is unbelieveable.

The videos on-line seem to show a smaller initial explosion with red smoke just before the main blast.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

The sad thing is, the smaller explosion would have peaked peoples interest, perhaps have them stood at windows in nearby building looking to see what was happening, and then the big blast would have come.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

The 2015 Tianjin explosion in China was only 800 tons of AN, that stripped concrete balcony's off tower blocks

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Tianjin_explosions

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

That stuff had only been sitting there for 6 or 7 years, what could possibly go wrong?

Unless there was some lengthy legality issue on ownership, you'd have thought they'd have sold most of it off by now (prospective buyers fully vetted ;) ) . . . or moved it away from such a highly populated area.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

There's only a split second between the small one and the main blast. It just looked interesting. There is some speculation that fireworks were also being stored in the warehouse so that could have been the smaller initial explosion with the red smoke.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

'Officials 'asked for ammonium nitrate to be moved'
The highly explosive substance blamed for Tuesday's blast was meant to be moved, the port's general manager has told local broadcaster OTV.

Hassan Koraytem said the ammonium nitrate had been in the port for six years, following a court order.

But, despite instructions from the customs department and state secretary to move or export it, "nothing happened", he told the broadcaster.'

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/worl...-east-53664184

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

I can see the excuses being rolled out now . . "We didn't want to risk moving it, and it falling into the wrong hands" :rolleyes:

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Was someone signing off an invoice to pay for the storage every year? Beggars belief. Seems like a really tragic and avoidable situation.

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Not really speculation, if you watch the videos you can clearly see and hear them going off in the fire before the main explosion.

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Keeping tons of highly explosive materal next to a fireworks factory is Simpsons-esque in it's absurdity.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Yep, and as with just about every case of stupidity & incompetence from officialdom, thousands of innocents suffer while those in charge 'lawyer up' and get the excuses in early :nutter:

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

I have seen many videos of what people saw, one was a woman and 3 you kids look out of a large window, the explosion blew the window in, but by a miracle the double glazing held and knocked them off their feet.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

I'll guarantee you one thing, it'll be the little man that cops it.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

The crater is 43m deep, about 141ft.


That is one hellva big hole.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Given the size of the explosion, I surprised its only 14 feet.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

The entire Lebanese government has resigned.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

The honourable thing to do. Hope the mechanisms are in place for the business of government to continue until a new one is in place.

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Why ?
Did they cause the explosion ?

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By all accounts they to a degree, facilitated it

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I seriously doubt anyone in their current government had anything to do with it.

From the accounts Ive seen, it was dumped there 6 years ago, with nothing more than the occasional request to a judge for permission to do something with it.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Whatever link that is triggered my FF to have a fit.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Oh dear!
Here you go
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-le...-idUKKCN2562L3

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

I assume its riddled with ads, uBlock is really not happy with it, so I'll give it a miss.

So basically someone sent them a letter two weeks ago ?
Although the actual letter hasnt been seen, so its unclear what it actually said ?

Also, this "has not previously been reported."

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Reuters is a leading British-based news agency which most news organisations subscribe to, and it dates back to 1851. It's far from being an ad-heavy website so might be worth trying it from another device like your phone.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

LOL.

As an avid user/reader of these forums, you should know I dont have a "smart" phone. :D

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Honestly didn't know that!

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

If you have a little spare monies to purchase a Raspberry Pi (or if you already have one, you can use that), set yourself up with Pi-Hole. I just checked the link and I get no ads at all.

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Ad block shows none, redirect not active, but script block shows 21 potentially hazardous scripts. FF (V52.9.0) shows the page OK, apart from a fuzzy picture, with these defences active.

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Page opened ok for me using Pale Moon, revealing a story with no story apart from uncorroborated 'facts'


Probably pulled a few in though for the Twitter experience ;)

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Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Signs of life detected 1 month after explosion :shocked:

https://news.sky.com/story/beirut-si...osion-12062894

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-mid...eporting-story

Re: Huge explosion in Lebanese capital, Beirut
 

Latest up-date is not looking good.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-54014940