Beirut Twin Blasts: Explosions That Ripped Through Lebanon Capital Caught On Camera, 73 Killed

Two enormous explosions devastated Beirut's port on August 4. At least 73 people died and 4,000 were left injured. The blasts led to shaking of distant buildings, spreading panic and chaos across the Lebanese capital. The second blast sent an enormous orange fireball into the sky, flattened the harbourside and drove a tornado-like shockwave through the city, shattering windows kilometres (miles) away. Blasts were heard throughout the small country and as far away as Nicosia on the eastern Mediterranean island of Cyprus, 240 kilometres (150 miles) away. Lebanon's President Michel Aoun called an urgent meeting of the national defence council, which declared Beirut a disaster zone. A three-day mourning period has been declared by the government. About 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate were stored in the Beirut port warehouse that exploded, Prime Minister Hassan Diab said. President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House, “It looks like a terrible attack.” Trump offered US assistance to Lebanon. The explosions hit a country already reeling from its worst economic crisis in decades which has left nearly half of the population in poverty, as well as from the coronavirus pandemic. The explosions came three days before a UN tribunal's verdict on the murder of former Lebanese premier Rafic Hariri, who was killed in a huge 2005 truck bomb attack.