I’m surprised that there is anything of that grain silo building left standing at all.
I read that it held 85% of the nation’s grain supplies at the time. (And Lebanon imports almost all of their grain.) What’s left in the building is no longer usable.
Ammonium nitrate = grey smoke
HMX = brown smoke
Well, he’s a high level official. Maybe there was other ■■■■ in there too.
Definitely not fireworks. They ignored repeated warnings about the dangers of the way they were storing it. Citizens are pissed.
Relative to TNT, that 2700 tons of AN would be equivalent to about a 1.8 kiloton blast.
The explosion was fueled by thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate that had been improperly stored at the city’s port for more than six years. Apparently set off by a fire, it was by far the biggest blast in Lebanon’s troubled history and caused an estimated $10 billion to 15 billion in damage, according to Beirut’s governor. It also destroyed 6,200 buildings and left hundreds of thousands of people homeless.
I’m amazed the death toll isn’t ten or twenty or even fifty times higher.
Me too. 
There must’ve been an evacuation during the initial fire. Not sure how long it was burning before that blast.
A while. I think you are right.
That has yet to be shown not to be the case.
Terrorists could easily have used that stockpile and triggered it with a small explosive device.
It’s obvious there is an initial incendiary followed by a large fire, a series of smaller explosions and then one massive explosion as the entire stockpile erupts.
It’s remarkably well intact bu with the amount of reinforced concrete and steel it’s really not surprising.
In some of the after photos I’ve seen though it appears the foundation may be compromised and that it’s leaning several degrees away from the force of the blast.
It appears it just helped to focus the blast back out across the harbor and inshore in about a 200 degree semi circle.
This is the best video I’ve been able to find so far of the final seconds leading up to the massive explosion.
It appears to begin as an incendiary event, how that was triggered may never be known but terrorism is always a strong possibility in that region.
In this case until more evidence is produced though I’m leaning towards gross stupidity on the part of Beirut’s/Lebanon’s gov’t.
One way or another this stockpile should have been dispersed years ago.
I must say, this one has become a serious contender for that spot in terms of wow factor. There’s so many different video angles too.
