Posted on 08/04/2020 3:55:29 PM PDT by rxsid
2,750 Tonnes Of Ammonium Nitrate Exploded: Lebanon PM On Beirut Blasts
"It is unacceptable that a shipment of 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate has been present for six years in a warehouse, without taking preventive measures," he said at a defence council meeting, a spokesman told a press conference.
(Excerpt) Read more at ndtv.com ...
It’s now gone
easily found...
Yeah, I saw that, but it’s fairly premature to announce much.
IMHO, it was far less than 2700 Tn, but more than 20,000 lbs, probably closer to 40,000-400,000 lb TNT equiv or say 20 - 200 TN, probably around 40 TN. Those metrics are just based upon the fireball. The white vapor blast cloud should yield better metrics in forensic analysis. IMHO, 2,700 Tn is about 2 orders of magnitude off. A 2,000 lb bomb is more than one order of magnitude less than observed physical phenomenon.
Looking at my Morse & Feshbach, who held chairs in Atmospheric Acoustics, an academic buzzword for atomic and nuclear blast forensics, the flash, blast and fireballs provide more accurate metrics with given atmospheric conditions.
Who knows, maybe another DUMB was attacked and it really was a bomb.
5 seconds a mile
“I thought that ammonium nitrate was an oxidizer, not an explosive in itself. It needs to be mixed with something like a petrolatum product to actually explode.”
yep, and it has to be exactly the right proportions and it has be very finely mixed ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANFO
The 1947 explosion you described actually occurred in Texas City on Galveston Bay, not in Galveston (about 10-15 miles SE).
Perhaps it was shipped there based on an order that fell through..fake order....then set fire to nearby firework factory....joe mossad....joe hizbollah....isis....james bond....many potential culprits..were the bags labeled “fertilizer” or ammonium nitrate? Mostly peaceful portland protesters practicing? I read 800 tons AM = 336 tons of tnt....so 2750 tons= 1,150 tons of tnt...about 1/17 of the hiroshima blast. Not to mention the fission heat and strange radioactive isotopes generated. Plus a-bomb was detonated about 2,000 feet up. If beirut bomb was that high up when detonated...way more damage.
The explosion, believed to be of warehouses that had been closed for several months, but where suspicious movement had been reported recently, ...
Sodium Nitrate is Chile Saltpeter - chemically there is not much difference if memory serves.
It is another strong oxidizer and functions as such.
The ammonium nitrate that exploded has been sitting there since 2013!
Good grief!
https://twitter.com/LalehKhalili/status/1290762410308050947
Yes, certainly does seem like there’s something other than “accidents” going on. Wow what an explosion. Yikes.
It doesn’t even have to be high humidity. I have seen it caked up in storage silos in NV. The desert of Nevada doesn’t get much dryer than that in the summer.
What’s crazy is that I have never seen places go to any effort to protect it from moisture. Not in transit nor in storage.
That’s the kind of tonnage stored only in underground bunkers.
Its one of the ingrediants for fertilizer.
Recent news is that the ammonia nitrate was seized from Russian ships that were transporting it to Gaza and Syria for use by the Islamofasists for IEDs etc. It was seized.
We will likely never know whether it was an accident, or whether it was a strategic act of destruction to prevent its being distributed across the Middle East.
Like President Trump, I do not believe it was accidental. Hezbollah took a huge hit. The Beirut authorities should not have been allowing Hezbollah to operate in the Port area of Beirut.
....becomes more unstable as it ages.****
I notice that is happening to me...
“There is a fire and lots of smaller explosions, many of which appear to be like fireworks first, and then the massive explosion. The second explosion was apparently in a building next to the original fire.”
In reviewing the Wiki history of Ammonium Nitrate explosions, it was unbelievable how many of them were caused by a nearby fire at a military site and a rocket or explosive device getting launched into the adjacent AN storage site.
Wile E. Coyote must be the guy in zoning for a lot of these places.
Safety first
But 2750? Quantity has a Quality all it’s own.
Old Saltpeter, 3-2-1, Saltpeter, sulphur, charcoal = Black Powder. Made it myself.
fireworks factory next door
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.