French authorities are confirming that an explosion at a petrochemical plant in southern France was the result of intentional actions.
The two tanks that exploded and burned were located about 1,600 feet apart which raised suspicions of French investigators. An electronic device “that could start a fire” was found in the ashes of the fire.
“The simultaneous explosion of the tanks, which are spaced about 500 metres (yards) from each other, is not the result of a technical accident. The thesis of criminal intent is clearly being considered,” a source close to french authorities told Reuters.
Prosecutors in Aix, France told a reporter for the BBC that the items were so badly damaged that they would need to be closely examined for any information.
The explosion comes a week after explosives and detonators were stolen from a military installation in Miramas, just 12 miles away from the explosion site. Investigators would not say there was a connection to Islamist militants but they were “keeping an open mind at this stage.”
The explosions took place on Bastille Day, the day France celebrates the storming of the Bastille at the end of the French revolution.
An IDF officer has released a report showing the number of IED attacks by Palestinians on Israelis has jumped ten fold in 2014.
The rise of 20 IEDs during 2014 compared to 2 in 2013 is indicative of a rise of across-the-board violence in the West Bank.
“The level of sophistication is not very high,” said Maj. Irad Hershkovitz, the demolitions officer of the Shomron Regional Brigade. “It’s not Yahya Ayyash. It’s not the Second Intifada. But there has been a very significant rise.”
Maj. Hershkovitz told the Times of Israel that most of the IEDs are explosives placed inside a cheap metal casing along with a watch or cell phone timer.
However, he said a crackdown has been taking place on bomb makers in the West Bank.
“The solution is the waves of arrests that we do,” he said, noting that the army is active in Area A, which is under full Palestinian control, and within the refugee camps surrounding Nablus. “There is not a night in which a few Palestinians are not arrested,” he said. “Nothing else can be done. That is what stops the wave of terror.”
An Iranian “nuclear expert” is among two people killed after a major explosion at a nuclear plant.
Iran’s official news agency confirmed the blast, saying that it took place around 10 a.m. in an “explosive materials production unit.” Witnesses reported hearing the explosion several miles from the blast site.
The location is one that Iranian officials have refused to allow inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency to visit since 2005. It is thought to be one of the locations where Iran is continuing to work on development of a nuclear bomb.
Israeli Internal Security Minister Yuval Steinitz told journalists last month that Israel had obtained reliable information the plant was carrying out secret tests on technology that could only be used for the detonation of a nuclear weapon.
Iran has been stalling in nuclear talks with western powers over its illegal nuclear program. The deadline for a permanent deal is set to be November 24.
(Note: This is a follow up to a story we carried on April 18, 2013 on an explosion at a fertilizer plant in West, Texas.)
The deaths of 15 people and the wounding of 226 others in an explosion at a West, Texas fertilizer plant was completely preventable according to the investigation into the incident.
The U.S. Chemical Safety Board said Tuesday that the incident “should never have occurred.”
“It resulted from the failure of a company to take the necessary steps to avert a preventable fire and explosion and from the inability of federal, state and local regulatory agencies to identify a serious hazard and correct it,” Chairman Rafael Moure-Eraso said. “The community clearly was not aware of the potential hazard at West Fertilizer.”
The board’s investigation found that the factory was storing ammonium nitrate inside a wooden building that left it very susceptible to fire. Ammonium nitrate is a common fertilizer but is also extremely explosive.
It has been used in terrorist attacks, such as the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing.
A new report shows that asteroids caused more than two dozen nuclear-level explosions in the Earth’s atmosphere.
The report from the B612 Foundation shows that the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization recorded 26 nuclear-level explosions between 2000 and 2013. One blast was dozens of times stronger than the Hiroshima bomb with an equivalent power of 16 kilotons of TNT.
Scientists quoted in the report say that the explosions were too high in the atmosphere to cause serious damage on the ground. However, the explosions show the significant threat to the planet from asteroid impacts.
“While most large asteroids with the potential to destroy an entire country or continent have been detected, less than 10,000 of the more than a million dangerous asteroids with the potential to destroy an entire major metropolitan area have been found by all existing space or terrestrially operated observatories,” former astronaut Ed Lu said.
Lu referenced the 2013 500-kiloton meteor explosion over Russia that caused significant damage to hundreds of square miles of homes and businesses.
Most of the University of California Berkeley campus has regained power after an overnight explosion blacked out campus buildings. Continue reading →
An explosion tore through a building on the UC Berkeley campus Monday evening, injuring some people and forcing a campuswide evacuation, officials said.
A fire engulfed a chemical plant in Oklahoma early Thursday, heating pressurized containers and causing several explosions, authorities said.
The Danlin plant in Thomas, Okla., caught fire at 10 p.m. local time (11 p.m. ET) Wednesday, according to fire officials. Continue reading →
Fire consumed a chemical plant west of Oklahoma City overnight Thursday, forcing evacuations but causing no injuries and leaving surrounding areas unscathed, officials said.
The fire and explosions at Danlin Industries in Thomas, Okla., about 85 miles west of the capital, according to Michael Galloway, Custer County emergency management director. Continue reading →
A fire destroyed a chemical plant and caused small explosions near a western Oklahoma town, forcing the evacuation of about a dozen people from nearby homes, but resulting in no injuries, a county emergency management official said on Thursday.
The fire erupted about 10:00 p.m. CDT (0300 GMT) Wednesday at a Danlin Industries facility outside Thomas, Oklahoma, a city of 1,181 people about 90 miles northwest of Oklahoma City. Continue reading →