At least four people have been killed and 500 injured in a massive explosion at one of Iran’s key ports, state media is reporting.
The suspected chemical blast took place at Shahid Rajaee, the country’s largest commercial port, near the southern city of Bandar Abbas on Saturday morning.
The explosion blew out windows and roofs of nearby buildings and destroyed cars. Residents reported feeling the impact of the blast up to 50km (31 miles) away.
Videos online show a fire growing into a huge inferno before the explosion, with people subsequently fleeing the blast and others lying wounded on the roads, surrounded by smoking debris.
On Saturday afternoon, fires were still raging at the wharfs as thick columns of thick, black smoke filled the air.
Authorities had dispatched helicopter crews to try and douse the flames, while medical crews rushed to transport the injured to hospitals.
Some workers were “still trapped under collapsed roofs and “we are trying to rescue them”, one official told local media according to BBC Persian.
Pictures also showed survivors on roads littered with twisted metal scraps and rubble.
The Shahid Rajaee port is Iran’s largest and most advanced terminal, through which much of the country’s commercial shipping transits.
The strategic site is located on the Strait of Hormuz, a major shipping channel for oil cargo.
Shahid Rajaee is also about 20km (12 miles) west of Bandar Abbas, Iran’s major port city on its south coast and home to the Iranian Navy’s main base.
According to state media reports, witnesses say the explosion occurred after a fire broke out and spread to unsealed containers storing “flammable materials” – most probably chemical materials.
“The source of this incident was the explosion of several containers stored in the Shahid Rajaee Port wharf area,” a local crisis management official was quoted as saying.
Customs officials later released a statement reported by Iranian state TV saying the explosion had probably resulted from a fire that had broken out in a hazmat and chemical materials storage depot.
One analyst firm said it believed the affected containers had contained solid fuel for ballistic missiles.
The fire had been the result of “improper handling of a shipment of solid fuel intended for use in Iranian ballistic missiles,” according to Ambrey Intelligence, a global maritime risk firm.
The firm said it had identified 12 merchant vessels within five nautical miles of the explosion when the incident occurred, seven of which had been berthed at the port at the time.
BBC NEWS
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