There are hardly any people who have not seen the image of the Beirut explosion in Lebanon thanks to the internet. The death toll from the August 5 blast has risen to 220. The country's officials say the estimated damage is more than ৩ 3 billion.
But how did such a big explosion happen? Both the president and the prime minister have blamed ammonium nitrate for the blast. The bomber struck shortly after noon in front of a Beirut port, setting fire to 2,850 tonnes of unsafe ammonium nitrate. Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab also had to resign in a nationwide protest after the blast.
What is ammonium nitrate responsible for such a large explosion, why is it so explosive, how to start an explosion and what should be done to prevent such an explosion from happening again?
What is ammonium nitrate?
Ammonium nitrate is a chemical with the symbol NH₄NO₃. A highly soluble substance. In 1859, the German chemist Johann Rudolf Glober (1804-6) made the first artificial ammonium nitrate. It is made by adding nitric acid to ammonia.
Ammonium nitrate is prepared by running aqueous solution of ammonia gas and nitric acid through pipes commercially. The reaction that occurs in this case is-
NH3 + HNO3 → NH4NO3
Extreme heat is generated during the reaction. This is why pipes and other materials have to be much stronger.
Although commonly used as fertilizer in agriculture, it has also been used as an explosive. But in the beginning it was not used as an explosive. It was first used as an explosive device in World War I. During the war, soldiers mixed ammonium nitrate with TNT dynamite to make cheap bombs, which exploded much larger than dynamite.