Seems similar to other “fireworks factories” in the area that have explode this summer, just a lot larger

This is terrifying. Everything obliterated.

Who knows what the true story is, but allegedy:

1) Doing hot work in the warehouse

2) Set off fireworks

3) Which then eventually set off 2700 tons of Ammoniun Nitrate, which was seized years ago and had been improperly stored ever since

My first thought was fertilizer, but who knows. Sounds like it's been sitting there for ages.

BREAKING — The Beirut explosion caused by highly explosive sodium nitrate confiscated from a ship more than a year ago and were placed in one of the warehouses located in the port — Sources to LBCI


Apparently a similar explosion with the same materials in China in 2015.

Poor people. Heartbreaking.

Certainly looks and sounds like a whole bunch of fireworks going off before the big blast:

the shockwave from that explosion is unreal (particularly how quickly it spread)

The mayor telling people to get out of the city. The air is now toxic. This is awful. Massive grain silo right there too gone now. This is a proper humanitarian disaster I hope they get serious aid globally and quickly.

Did you watch the whole thing? It wasn’t fireworks. It was stored chemicals. Not a time for pettty nit pickin tbh

If you wanna donate Red Cross are the way to go

http://www.redcross.org.lb/SubPage.aspx ... 70&PID=158

The clip with the mushroom cloud & shock wave is one of the most jaw dropping videos I have seen in a while. Like I imagine a nuclear bomb would be like.

I presume the explosion was not efficient, but the ammonium nitrate present had the equivalent energy of 1 kt of TNT. The bombs dropped on Japan had the equivalent energy of 15 and 20kt.

Ammonium nitrate ain't shit to fuck with.

Timothy McVeigh used 2 tons to blow up that federal building in 1996, that Texas factory that blew up from it was 600 tons, this was nearly 3,000 tons.

Whoever the fuck decided to keep 3,000 tons of that sitting in an urban area was a fucking idiot.

Sounds like it's comparable to the Texas City disaster, where the ship's propeller was found a mile inland.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster

Crazy that this happens more than once.

Minor quibble: McVeigh used ANFO (ammonium nitrate fuel oil) Ammonium Nitrate is explosive, but something like 0.4 as energetic as TNT. ANFO brings it up to 0.7 as energetic as TNT.

I am curious about the claim that AN needs a primary charge. Seems like a widespread fire for a long duration might just reduce the activation energy required for a proper explosion.

Also, apparently we get explosions from kiloton quantities of Ammonium Nitrate every other decade or so, it just tends to occur in lesser populated areas in larger developed countries.

Beginning to look not all that coincidental

Correction: Ammonium Nitrate is generally not considered explosive. It will normally just burn.

If you have a critical mass of it that is not readily predictable, it will explode when ignited and allowed to burn.

Unfortunately, the mass of material in Beiruit was equal to or larger than previous AN explosions, so this one was forseeable.

The Beirut blast registered on Richter scales as far away as Amsterdam in the Netherlands.

That’s insane.