Up in smoke

On August 4, 2020, a series of powerful explosions rocked the city of Beirut, the capital of Lebanon. The shockwave from the main explosion at the dock was felt more than 240 kilometres away in Cyprus. Seismologists recorded the tremors caused by the blast at 3.3 on the Richter scale and the radius of damage in Beirut was reported to be within 10 km of the blast. Closer to the centre, the main explosion left a crater that is 140 metres across in the port area. While it is difficult to get complete estimates for the damage done, at present, the death toll is estimated at 137 dead, over 5,000 wounded and around 300,000 left homeless. The material cost is being estimated at between USD 10-15 billion. The explosion did more than devastate thousands of lives, it also ripped away the thin veil that covers the concerning levels of governmental corruption in Lebanon. The mood is oppressive with many of the citizens in a revolutionary state of mind against a regime that has repeatedly let them down. While the complete picture may take a while to come out in the open give the general ensuing chaos, a working theory has been established. The answer is improperly stored ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive fertiliser. The warehouse where the 'accidental' fire started was supposed to be holding close to 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate, a blast force that some have estimated as being equivalent to 500 tons of TNT. Do note that accidental has been kept in single quotes because the accidental nature of the fire is still very much in doubt as is always the case in such events. After all, the commonness of ammonium nitrate has made it a popular explosive ingredient in terrorist attacks and bombings over the years. It has been stated that the fertiliser was unloaded at the docks after being confiscated from a ship six years ago. For now, the ship has been identified as the MV Rhosus, a ship from the nation of Georgia which was initially seized when it encountered technical problems at the port on its way to Mozambique.

Obviously, with the scale and abruptness of the blast, many have compared the Beirut explosion to the one that infamously ripped through the docks at the Port of Halifax a century ago. At that time, the blast was presumed to be caused when the Norwegian ship SS Imo collided with the SS Mont-Blanc, a French ship containing high explosives en route to the war in Europe in 1917. It was estimated that close to 2,000 people died and over 9,000 were injured. For a long time, it was the greatest tragedy of its kind. But it is worth noting that side by side comparisons of the explosions at Beirut and Halifax has shown that the Halifax blast reported damage as far away as three kilometres from the blast while the one at Beirut reported damage 10 kilometres away.

Discussions of explosion scale aside, the citizens of Beirut are growing increasingly agitated as the Government has admitted to official negligence being the cause of the explosion. On Lebanese social media, discussions are already underway regarding whose heads will hang as the Government seeks to find the responsible officials in an ever-widening blame game that is playing out. As a national emergency was declared, the Government also announced that it had arrested an unspecified number of officials in an investigation regarding how such a vast amount of explosive material could be stored less than 100 metres from residential neighbourhoods. Regardless of what form of appeasement the Government tries, it would seem that the people of Beirut are in no mood to be placated. Even French President Emmanuel Macron was accused of "Sitting with the Warlords" when he visited the site of the devastation. As many have pointed out, such an explosion could not come at a worse time. Lebanon's economy is in shambles, social unrest is at a peak and a pandemic is rampaging. Most significantly, the explosion came just before a UN tribunal was set to give a verdict on the 2005 assassination of the former Lebanese PM, a verdict that was set to stir up the age-old Shia-Sunni rift in the nation. Further complicating matter are reports that the explosion was likely caused by events that are difficult to see as accidental. Certain experts have claimed that it is very difficult for ammonium nitrate to detonate in this manner, even given the sheer amount of it present. As was the case with Halifax, it seems unlikely that a crystal clear picture of causes will be established. Still, the explosion has sparked off concerns of similarly negligently stored ammonium nitrate elsewhere in the world as well. Concerns have been raised in India over the storage of large quantities of the chemical in Visakhapatnam. The Tamil Nadu Government is also presently coordinating with the Customs Department for safe disposal of 740 tons of the chemical that is stored near Chennai. Similar efforts may be seen worldwide in the future.