# Ammonium Nitrate - cause of Beirut explosion!!??



## corneliani (Apr 2, 2019)

I was catching up on the news this morning seeing the IMMENSE explosion captured on video - just amazing to see btw! - to hear that they're suspecting the cause to be improperly stored Ammonium Nitrate fertilizer at the port.

:shock: :  ugeek: :shock: :?

I'm assuming this is the Oklahoma City event for that part of the world, which causes it to go under lock & key if it hasnt already.

Yikes.


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## HoosierLawnGnome (Sep 28, 2017)

It may have already been under lock and key, given it was stored in a warehouse. That wasn't a home stockpile.


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## rhanna (Jun 7, 2017)

It's reported that 1000 times more exploded in Beirut


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

I think that AN was in liquid or gas form and not in solid. 2700 metric tons of AN is a lot.


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## MarshalOfFire (Apr 22, 2020)

The explosion at the Federal building in OKC was 2 tons, the one in Beirut was 2700 tons, just to put it into comparison. The OKC bombing was ANPHO, which is just AN and diesel, but the diesel is mainly a catalyst to get the AN to react. There were reports of windows broken over 15 miles away, which is insane.

AN is also what exploded in West, Texas a few years ago and killed those firefighters. It is pretty highly regulated in the US, and rightfully so.


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## 94Spartan (May 8, 2020)

I remember learning about this incident in a soil fertility class. April 16, 1947, in the Port of Texas City, Texas, at Galveston Bay. It was the deadliest industrial accident in U.S. history, and one of history's largest non-nuclear explosions. A mid-morning fire started on board the SS Grandcamp, and detonated about 2,200 tons of ammonium nitrate. The resulting explosions and fires killed almost 600.


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## FRD135i (Oct 15, 2017)




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## corneliani (Apr 2, 2019)

So the story of how this AN ended up in the Beirut port, as I've read it, is something out of a movie!! I mean, you can't script something like this.

The story is that a Russian dude owned this dilapidated ship.. and was moving some ammonium nitrate out of Georgia (country) and to Mozambique (or some other such African country.. I forget exactly). On the way there there's a mutiny on the ship due to crew not being paid so they pull into a Turkish port and leave. Another crew comes to take over and on the way to Africa they divert - seems the owner does not have or does not want to pay the $ for passage through the strait! So to Beirut they divert with plans to pick up a load of heavy machinery - but alas, once they get there they figure that the equipment is too large for the ship! In the meantime the ship is accruing port fees, and can't leave until they settle the tab. The crew is stuck on this ship, in the Beirut port, for TWO YEARS! Finally they let them go home and Lebanon impounds the ship & cargo, storing it in a warehouse at the port. The rest is history &#128563;&#128563;

WTF ??!!!?!$?!?$ &#128563;


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