Lebanon Explosion

[OnMyWay]

Wow!  Prayers to the people there.  I think it looks like an accident, but that remains to be seen.  If if was an accident, the site certainly was not managed well. The fire was ongoing, so many videos of the actual explosion.

It would appear that that the large white building right next to the explosion was vaporized.  The initial death counts indicate that perhaps the area had been evacuated.  I hope so.

 

[GeoffH]

They are saying that there was about 2700 tons of ammonium nitrate stored there.

I'm not sure how the explosive power of that compares ton to ton versus TNT but if it's ton for ton then it would be about 20% of the Hiroshima fission bomb yield (which I guess explains the dome explosion and the short lived mushroom cloud) :(

[jimeve]

2 Filipinos killed.

[Hobbit112]

16 hours ago, GeoffH said:

They are saying that there was about 2700 tons of ammonium nitrate stored there.

I'm not sure how the explosive power of that compares ton to ton versus TNT but if it's ton for ton then it would be about 20% of the Hiroshima fission bomb yield (which I guess explains the dome explosion and the short lived mushroom cloud) :(

If I am reading Wikipedia correctly the explosiveness (?) of Ammonium Nitrate is about 40% of TNT, pound for pound.

[OnMyWay]

Scroll down on this CNN page to look at a before and after satellite image that you can slide back and forth.  The large white building next to the blast site was not completely vaporized, but most of the nearby warehouses are completely gone.

Actually, I just noticed that there are several of these scrollable images if you go down further.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/05/world/satellite-images-beirut-explosion-before-after-trnd/index.html

Edited August 6, 2020 by OnMyWay

[GeoffH]

58 minutes ago, Hobbit112 said:

If I am reading Wikipedia correctly the explosiveness (?) of Ammonium Nitrate is about 40% of TNT, pound for pound.

Thanks for the information Hobbit112.

That would make the explosion roughly 40% or 2750 or around 1100 tonnes of TNT equivelent. 

Quite a bit smaller than I'd guessed but still a huge explosion (and slightly more than the W54 tactical nuclear weapon).

I'm sorry if I keep comparing this explosion to nukes but it's just so big that conventional weapons don't match up :(

[Snowy79]

That'll set Hamas back a few years.

[jimeve]

2 hours ago, GeoffH said:

Thanks for the information Hobbit112.

That would make the explosion roughly 40% or 2750 or around 1100 tonnes of TNT equivelent. 

Quite a bit smaller than I'd guessed but still a huge explosion (and slightly more than the W54 tactical nuclear weapon).

I'm sorry if I keep comparing this explosion to nukes but it's just so big that conventional weapons don't match up :(

I read that it was compared to 1/5th of the Hiroshima nuke. Ironic that it's the 75th anniversary of Hiroshima nuke.

[Gator]

On 8/5/2020 at 1:07 AM, OnMyWay said:

It would appear that that the large white building right next to the explosion was vaporized. 

One of the TV news channels I was watching reported that the large white building was grain silo(s). Depending on the type of grain and how full they were they could have also instantaneously exploded and added to the blast. 
 

[graham59]

Grain silos are built to withstand explosions (which could occur in them, due to 'dust') , so pretty strong...as proven there.