Did you see that explosion in Beirut ?

[fastfredracing]

Wonder what it was, munitions, a chemical/petroleum plant ?
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjig-r5iYLrAhUXac0KHSvaBWwQ0PADMAN6BAgNEA8&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2020%2F08%2F04 %2Fworld%2Fmiddleeast%2Fbeirut-explosion-blast.html&usg=AOvVaw0zrCgHXAfr7IBdVFQAnZiK

[sammyg2]

An O'fficial said it was a ship full of fireworks in the harbor, but I ain't convinced yet.

[sammyg2]

10 Dead as Massive Explosion Shakes Lebanese Capital Beirut
Tuesday, 04 August 2020 01:36 PM

A huge explosion near the center of Beirut killed at least 10 people, injured hundreds and sent shockwaves across the Lebanese capital, shattering windows and causing apartment balconies to collapse, witnesses and security sources said.

The most powerful explosion to hit Beirut in years shook the ground, leaving some residents thinking an earthquake had struck. Dazed and weeping, some of them wounded, people walked through streets checking to see if relatives were hurt.

The blast occurred in the city's port area, where there were warehouses housing explosives, Lebanon's state news agency NNA and two security sources said. A third security source said there were chemicals stored in the area.

Footage of the blast shared by residents on social media showed a column of smoke rising from the port district followed by an enormous blast. Those filming what initially appeared to be a big blaze were thrown backwards by the shock of the explosion.

At least 10 bodies were taken to hospitals, a security source and a medical source told Reuters. The Lebanese Red Cross said hundreds of people were taken hospitals for treatment.

Lebanese President Michel Aoun called for an emergency meeting of the country's Supreme Defence Council, according to the presidency's Twitter account.

It was not immediately clear what caused the blaze that set off the blast or what kind of explosives were in the warehouses.

Lebanon's Internal Security Chief Abbas Ibrahim, touring the port area, said he would not pre-empt investigations. An Israeli official said Israel had nothing to do with the blast.

The governor of Beirut port told Sky News that a team of firefighters at the scene had "disappeared" after the explosion.

"I saw a fireball and smoke billowing over Beirut. People were screaming and running, bleeding. Balconies were blown off buildings. Glass in high-rise buildings shattered and fell to the street," said a Reuters witness.

The health minister told Reuters there was a "very high number" of injured. Al Mayadeen TV said hundreds were wounded.

Another Reuters witness said she saw heavy grey smoke near the port area and then heard an explosion and saw flames and black smoke: "All the downtown area windows are smashed and there are wounded people walking around. It is total chaos."

U.N. spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters it was not immediately clear what the cause was, and that there was no indication of any injuries to any U.N. personnel.

“We do not have information about what has happened precisely, what has caused this, whether it’s accidental or manmade act,” he said.

The U.S. Pentagon said: "We are aware of the explosion and are concerned for the potential loss of life due to such a massive explosion."

In Cyprus, an island lying west of Lebanon, residents reported two large bangs in quick succession. One resident of the capital Nicosia said his house shook, rattling shutters.

© 2020 Thomson/Reuters. All rights reserved.

https://www.newsmax.com/world/globaltalk/apnewsalert/2020/08/04/id/980468/

[masraum]

If you put your cursor over the video, then click the "gear" icon, you can change the playback speed to .75x, .5x or .25x (or speed it up if you want). The slow-mo is impressive.

[DRONE]

The Shock wave is impressive must have been a very humid day to be able to see the water vapor turn into a white cloud

[Arizona_928]

Looks like building fire that went kaboom

[Tobra]

Yeah, building explosive devices

Ship full of fireworks, did they really say that?

[911_Dude]

Sat photos show a giant crater filled with water where the warehouse was. Sorry, cant find the pic.

[URY914]

[Dpmulvan]

Lol fireworks yeh right. Now they’re saying abandoned ammonium nitrate??? In that part of the world it can be one of two things. Either terrorists or Israel blowing up terrorists munitions.

[widgeon13]

2700 tons of ammonium nitrate! What the news says.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by Dpmulvan

Lol fireworks yeh right. Now they’re saying abandoned ammonium nitrate??? In that part of the world it can be one of two things. Either terrorists or Israel blowing up terrorists munitions.

Actually in one of the many videos that I've seen, you can clearly see/hear fireworks going off in the smoke before the main explosion.

So yes, I think they stored fireworks near the 2700tons of ammonium nitrate.

[Baz]

[red-beard]

Yep. I read today that the shipment was from Russia to Mozambique, in 2014. The Russian company ran out of money and tried to pickup extra cargo in Beirut. They apparently failed some inspections and they were prevented leaving port. The crew Mutinied due to not being paid and not being given enough food. Company went out of business.

2700 Tons of Ammonium Nitrate fertilizer was left in Beirut. The port authority tried MANY TIMES to get rid of the cargo, which eventually was moved to the building. Obviously, without an "owner" it was not maintained.

Texas City explosion in Galveston was a bit over 2000 short tons. This was almost 50% larger.

[GH85Carrera]

I know even less about international selling of Ammonium Nitrate fertilizer as I do as the way women think. BUT, bet with a ship load of Ammonium Nitrate fertilizer, and a sell order on the open world market for best offer, someone would come get it for some money. If nothing else charge them a big docking and loading fee and exit tax. It was not a toxic or uncommon product. It had value. But that is all hindsight.

[sammyg2]

Might have had pending law suits or debt claims, stuff like that can get held up in court for years.
So it sits.

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

Might have had pending law suits or debt claims, stuff like that can get held up in court for years.
So it sits.

I will bet money that every port in the world will have a set of rules for explosive products after this. The government can just give the last owner 24 hours to get a sale in place or it is seized and will be sold the the highest bidder right now. Get that product back in the ships and delivered to the clients that know how to handle it.

[sammyg2]

Beirut explosion linked to Russian ship storing ammonium nitrate left in port, called 'floating bomb'

Investigators probing the devastating blast in Beirut that killed at least 135 people and injured 5,000 more are pointing to a Russian ship docked in the city's port for nearly seven years without appropriate security precautions that officials warned was “a floating bomb.”

The Russian vessel, named MV Rhosus, carrying agricultural fertilizer with 2,750 metric tons of ammonium nitrate and en route to Mozambique hit a financial snag and docked in the Beruit port in 2013, according to legal documents and Lebanese officials, the Washington Post reported.

Lebanon’s director of customs, Badri Daher, repeatedly sent letters to the judiciary over the years and warned that the cargo was the equivalent of “a floating bomb," but the warnings went unheeded.

Daher repeatedly asked officials to remove the ammonium nitrate from the port because it posed a significant danger of exploding, he said during an interview with LBC TV late Wednesday.

Daher said flagging the risks to authorities was "extra work" for him and his predecessors outside of his responsibility to prevent smuggling and collecting duties.

He says it was the port authority's job to monitor the material and store it appropriately.

The Russian ship was held at the port after reporting "technical problems" and inspectors barred it from sailing onwards.

“Owing to the risks associated with retaining the Ammonium Nitrate on board the vessel, the port authorities discharged the cargo onto the port’s warehouses,” lawyers acting on behalf of creditors wrote in 2015, according to the Post. “The vessel and cargo remain to date in port awaiting auctioning and/or proper disposal."

The lawyers said the ship was abandoned by its owners after running out of supplies and the crew had to eventually be repatriated back to Russia because of immigration restrictions on a prolonged stay in Beirut.

The blast Tuesday, which appeared to have been caused by an accidental fire that ignited a warehouse that was full of ammonium nitrate, rippled across the Lebanese capital, causing widespread destruction.

Losses from the blast are estimated to be between $10 billion to $15 billion, Beirut Gov. Marwan Abboud told the Saudi-owned TV station Al-Hadath on Wednesday, adding that nearly 300,000 people are homeless.

Lebanon President Michel Aoun vowed before a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday that the investigation would be transparent and that those responsible will be punished.

The cabinet ordered an unspecified number of Beirut port officials put under house arrest pending an investigation into how ammonium nitrate came to be stored at the port for years. The government also declared a two-week state of emergency, effectively giving the military full powers during this time.

https://www.foxnews.com/world/russian-ship-storing-ammonium-nitrate-was-left-in-beirut-port-without-safety-precautions-repo

[mpeastend]

What's most amazing is that the grain elevator building next to the warehouses is still standing. Who built that?! That's impressive.

[sammyg2]

Beirut’s Accidental Cargo: How An Unscheduled Port Visit Led To Disaster
August 6, 2020
By Maria Vasilyeva

MOSCOW (Reuters) – The chemicals that went up in flames in Beirut’s deadliest peace-time explosion arrived in the Lebanese capital seven years ago on a leaky Russian-leased cargo ship that, according to its captain, should never have stopped there.

“They were being greedy,” said Boris Prokoshev, who was captain of the Rhosus in 2013 when he says the owner told him to make an unscheduled stop in Lebanon to pick up extra cargo.

Prokoshev said the ship was carrying 2,750 tonnes of a highly combustible chemical from Georgia to Mozambique when the order came to divert to Beirut on its way through the Mediterranean.

The crew were asked to load some heavy road equipment and take it to Jordan’s Port of Aqaba before resuming their journey onto Africa, where the ammonium nitrate was to be delivered to an explosives manufacturer.

But the ship was never to leave Beirut, having tried and failed to safely load the additional cargo before becoming embroiled in a lengthy legal dispute over port fees.

“It was impossible,” Prokoshev, 70, told Reuters of the operation to try and load the extra cargo. “It could have ruined the whole ship and I said no,” he said by ‘phone from his home in the Russian resort town of Sochi on the Black Sea coast.

The captain and lawyers acting for some creditors accused the ship’s owner of abandoning the vessel and succeeded in having it arrested. Months later, for safety reasons, the ammonium nitrate was unloaded and put in a dock warehouse.

On Tuesday, that stockpile caught fire and exploded not far from a built-up residential area of the city. The huge blast killed 145 people, injured 5,000, flattened buildings and made more than a quarter of a million people homeless.

The ship might have succeeded in leaving Beirut, had it managed to load the additional cargo.

The crew had stacked the equipment, including excavators and road-rollers, on top of the doors to the cargo hold which held the ammonium nitrate below, according to the ship’s Ukrainian boatswain, Boris Musinchak. But the hold doors buckled.

“The ship was old and the cover of the hold bent,” Musinchak said by ‘phone. “We decided not to take risks.”

The captain and three crew spent 11 months on the ship while the legal dispute dragged on, without wages and with only limited supplies of food. Once they left, the ammonium nitrate was unloaded.

“The cargo was highly explosive. That’s why it was kept on board when we were there … That ammonium nitrate had a very high concentration,” Prokoshev said.

Prokoshev identified the ship’s owner as Russian businessman Igor Grechushkin. Attempts to contact Grechushkin were unsuccessful.

The ammonium nitrate was sold by Georgian fertilizer maker Rustavi Azot LLC, and was to be delivered to a Mozambique explosives maker, Fabrica de Explosivos.

A senior representative for Fabrica de Explosivos did not immediately respond when sent a request for comment on LinkedIn.

Levan Burdiladze, the Rustavi Azot plant director, told Reuters that his company had only operated the chemical factory for the last three years and so he could not confirm whether the ammonium nitrate was produced there.

He called the decision to store the material in Beirut port a “gross violation of safe storage measures, considering that ammonium nitrate loses its useful properties in six months.”

Initial Lebanese investigations into what happened have pointed to inaction and negligence in the handling of the potentially dangerous chemical.

Lebanon’s cabinet on Wednesday agreed to place all Beirut port officials who have overseen storage and security since 2014 under house arrest, ministerial sources said.

The head of Beirut port and the head of customs said that several letters were sent to the judiciary asking for the material be removed, but no action was taken.

Reuters could not immediately reach Lebanon’s justice minister for comment. The Justice Ministry is closed for three days of national mourning.

According to Prokoshev, the ship had been leaking but was seaworthy when it sailed into Beirut in September 2013. However, he said Lebanese authorities paid little attention to the ammonium nitrate, which had been stacked in the hull in large sacks.

“I feel sorry for the people (killed or injured in the blast). But local authorities, the Lebanese, should be punished. They did not care about the cargo at all,” he said.

The abandoned Rhosus sank where she was moored in Beirut harbour, according to a May, 2018 email from a lawyer to Prokoshev, which said it had gone down “recently”.

https://www.oann.com/beiruts-accidental-cargo-how-an-unscheduled-port-visit-led-to-disaster/