Posted in: 28/07/2022 – 14:20Last updated: 28/07/2022 – 14:21
About two weeks following a fire broke out in the northern part of the grain silos in the port of Beirut, the Lebanese authorities warned of the danger of its collapse. This warning comes days before the second anniversary of the horrific explosion that hit the port on August 4, 2020.
On Wednesday, the Lebanese authorities issued a warning of the “risk of falling” in the northern part of the rift… Grain silos in the port of BeirutNearly two weeks following the fire broke out, Lebanon will mark next week the second anniversary of the horrific explosion.
The Minister of Environment in the caretaker government, Nasser Yassin, told the Prime Minister-designate, according to a statement issued by the latter’s office, that the monitoring and sensors in the silos “detected changes in the bending speed from 2 mm per day to 2.5 mm per hour for the northern group of silos, which are now in danger.” the fall”.
This warning comes two weeks following a fire broke out in the northern part of the silos, which, according to authorities and experts, resulted from the fermentation of grain stocks with high temperatures and humidity. Attempting to put out the fires by spraying water in the previous days increased the moisture of the grains.
The fire brought to the minds of the Lebanese people scenes from the explosion of August 4, 2020, which killed more than two hundred people, injured more than 6,500 others, and caused extensive destruction to the port and a number of neighborhoods in the capital.
For his part, Mikati instructed the concerned agencies to “prevent any of the workers or members of the civil defense and the fire brigade from approaching them in order to preserve their safety.” He also asked “the army and the Disaster Management Authority to prepare in anticipation of the fall of parts of the building.”
According to the Ministry of Environment, the southern silos are still standing, without any movements threatening their safety.
Some silos contain regarding 3,000 tons of wheat and grain, which might not be unloaded due to the danger of working near them, fearing that this would accelerate “the movement of the structure of the silos that was already cracked and the collapse of large parts of them,” according to the authorities.
The Ministries of Environment and Public Health issued preventive directives Monday regarding the emission of dust consisting of construction waste and some fungi from rotting grains in the event of the fall of the northern silos. The most prominent of these included the necessity of evacuating the port immediately, placing high-effective masks, and closing doors and windows in the area surrounding the port for 24 hours, while wearing masks outside.
In April, the government took a decision to demolish the silos, fearing for public safety, but suspended its implementation following objections submitted by civil groups and the committee of families of the victims of the port explosion, which demanded that the silos be turned into a landmark witnessing the explosion.
The explosion resulted, according to the authorities, from storing large quantities of ammonium nitrate inside the port without preventive measures, following the outbreak of a fire whose causes were unknown. It later emerged that officials at several levels were aware of the dangers of storing the material and did nothing.
The judicial investigations, which have been suspended for months, have not made any progress, in light of political interference and lawsuits once morest the judicial investigator, which are filed successively by a number of defendants, including current MPs and former ministers.
FRANCE 24/AFP