A fire, a warehouse, and 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate. The Beirut explosion wasn’t just a tragedy—it was the result of years of corruption and neglect.

The plant faces an explosion hazard due to the use of ammonium nitrate, which is used to source nitrogen in fertilizer. However, ammonium nitrate can also be used to create mining explosives.

Analytical chemist Najat Saliba describes the part scientists could play as investigations into the cause of Beirut’s devastating ammonium nitrate blast get under way.

Lebanese officials knew that more than half the bags of a 2,750-ton stockpile of ammonium nitrate that caused a deadly explosion in Beirut were damaged six years ago but took no action to dispose ...

The preliminary investigation traced the source of the explosions to nearly three thousand tonnes of ammonium nitrate (NH 4 NO 3), which was confiscated six years ago by the local authority and has ...

It has since been established that the explosion was caused by the ignition of 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate (AN) stored at the port.

In agriculture, ammonium nitrate fertilizer is applied in granule form and quickly dissolves under moisture, allowing nitrogen -- which is key to plant growth — to be released into the soil.

At high enough temperatures, however, ammonium nitrate can violently decompose on its own. This process creates gases including nitrogen oxides and water vapour. It is this rapid release of gases that ...

After explosion health risks The massive blast from 2,700 tons of ammonium nitrate produces enormous amounts of nitrogen oxides.