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"It's A Warzone": Images Of Devastation After Chinese Explosion; Toxic Chemicals Feared; Port Ops Disrupted
Daylight has arrived after the massive explosion in the Chinese port of Tianjin, and reveals nothing but devastation, or as the following tweet from Offbeat China describes it, "a warzone":
War zone #tianjin pic.twitter.com/CiySwCOFXl
— Offbeat China (@OffbeatChina) August 13, 2015
According to the latest report from Xinhua, following the series of enormous explosions at an industrial area in Tianjin, at least 44 people were dead including 12 firefighters, with at least 520 injured, 66 of which in critical condition.
Album: Death toll reach 44 in #Tianjin warehouse #explosion, 12 firefighters are among the dead pic.twitter.com/c6fPlTVN9o
— China Xinhua News (@XHNews) August 13, 2015
According to an AFP reporter at the scene there was shattered glass up to three kilometres (two miles) from the blast site, after a shipment of explosives detonated in a warehouse, raining debris on the city and starting huge fires. As the following image shows, the heat was so intense it melted hub caps:
Tianjin explosion so infernal even wheel hub melt away http://t.co/a1EjD52rsE via Weibo pic.twitter.com/N6m4wwvyhx
— Patrick Zuo (@P_Zuo) August 13, 2015
As we first showed yesterday, images showed a monumental blast soaring into the air, walls of flame enveloping buildings, ranks of burned-out cars, and shipping containers scattered like children's building blocks.
"The fireball was huge, maybe as much as 100 metres tall," said 27-year-old Huang Shiting, who lives close to the site. "I heard the first explosion and everyone went outside, then there was a series of more explosions, windows shattered and a lot of people who were inside were hurt and came running out, bleeding."
AFP further reports that paramedics stretchered the wounded into the city's hospitals as doctors bandaged up victims, many of them covered in blood after the impact of the explosion was felt for several kilometres, even being picked up by a Japanese weather satellite.
The magnitude of the first explosion was the equivalent of detonating three tonnes of TNT, the China Earthquake Networks Centre said on its verified Weibo account, followed by a second blast equal to 21 tonnes.
Police took into custody the head of the company involved, Tianjin Dongjiang Port Rui Hai International Logistics, local authorities said.
Communist Party newspaper the People's Daily said in a social media post that there were people trapped by the fire, but CCTV said efforts to put out the blaze had been suspended as it was not clear what dangerous items remained in the storage facility.
Specialised anti-chemical warfare troops were being sent to the site, the broadcaster added.
Which brings up the question of just what toxic pollutants are currently floating in the air: according to China Youth Daily, the possibility of there being cyanide at the accident site in Tianjin cannot be ruled out.
The newspaper quoted Doctor Wu Chunping's saying that the commodities stored at the explosive warehouse include hazardous chemicals such as sodium cyanide and toluene diisocyanate which can penetrate into human bodies through the skin and cause poisoning. Dr. Wu suggested preventive measures be taken. People should better wear gas masks so as not to expose their mouths and skin, he said.
Wu explained that a single hazardous chemical explosion can be relatively easily targeted, while the situation in the Tianjin accident on Wednesday is different and more difficult to handle because it involved many varieties of hazardous chemicals.
In addition, a variety of hazardous chemicals will interact after the explosion to form more stable and more complex compounds and produce other toxic substances that fill the air and are difficult to dispel. Therefore, the follow-up work must include physical protection, Dr. Wu said.
For obvious reasons the local authorities are keeping complete silence on the question of what toxins may have been released after the explosion:
still no info on the "dangerous goods" that triggered the explosion. Tianjin TV barely mentioned it in morning news. https://t.co/8oPbEOgbhc
— Li Yuan (@LiYuan6) August 13, 2015
AP confirms as much:
Police are keeping journalists and bystanders away with a cordon as many as a few kilometers (miles) from the site. On China's popular microblogging platform of Weibo, some users complain that their posts about the blasts have been deleted, and the number of searchable posts on the disaster fluctuated, in a sign that authorities are manipulating or placing limits on the number of posts.
But while the Chinese government may be content that the locals are expendable, and nobody needs to know about the true aftermath of the chemical plant explosion, where it gets serious is that a critical component to China's trade infrastructure will likely be disrupted - about 15 mills get their ore from Tianjin port - and inbound iron ore shipments will likely be put on hiatus for the time being thus impairing China's growth even further.
Putting the port's importance in context, Tianjin handled 25.08 million tons of iron ore imports in the first half of the year, or 5.5 percent of the country’s total, according to customs data. It also shipped out about 30 percent of the country’s steel exports in the period.
Iron ore shipments to China have been disrupted after deadly explosions at Tianjin’s port prompted authorities to restrict vessels calling at the facility that funnels commodities into the north and ships out steel.
“There was no damage to the iron ore discharging berths following the explosion,” Melbourne-based BHP Billiton Ltd. said in a statement on Thursday. “However, shipments and port operations have been disrupted as a result and we are working with our customers to minimize any potential impact.”
Mills in China are the world’s largest buyers of iron ore and the blasts, which rocked the city late on Wednesday night killing at least 17, will prompt shippers, traders and users to tap stockpiles and seek alternative routes. The explosions occurred at a hazardous-goods warehouse, according to a statement from the port. Iron ore prices dropped to the lowest level since at least 2009 last month as miners including BHP boosted output while demand growth stalled in China.
“It is unclear the extent of the disruption likely to be experienced to port activities,” Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. said in a statement. The company is Australia’s third-largest shipper. “We will be monitoring the situation.”
Ore with 62 percent content delivered to Qingdao, another Chinese port, rose 0.2 percent to $56.31 a dry metric ton on Wednesday, according to Metal Bulletin Ltd. The data are issued daily, with yesterday’s figure coming before the blasts were reported from Tianjin.
As usually happens, every human tragedy has a silver lining for someone, in this case for iron ore makers:
“This is a developing story, which could have a potentially positive short-term impact on pricing,” Clarksons Platou Securities Inc. said in a note. Material damage to the port could result in short-term disruptions to iron ore delivery, as well as lost or damaged stockpiles, it said.
Still, Stockpiles at the port’s Beijiang wharf were estimated at 1.4 million tons, while holdings at the Nanjiang wharf were 5.7 million tons. Also, other ports on China’s eastern coastline, especially those in Shandong and Hebei provinces, could accommodate the capacity that Tianjin’s not be able to handle, according to Helen Lau, an analyst at Argonaut Securities in Hong Kong.
So any disrpuption should be manageable, but at least the government will now have a handy "scapegoat" for any substantial GDP Q3 miss.
Some more photos from the Tianjin devastation:







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not the first time, wont be the last time... hazmat not stored correctly and hot temperatures... here's the result.
but hey, screw that, let's play "US" here and blame iunno, let's say... Philippines and invade them, reduce their country to rubble and then a decade later admit it wasn't them at all... but not in a way that anyone really bothers paying attention to.
Krugman is aroused.
A bit like a small scale Texas City Explosion of 1947
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster
Looks like VW and Porsche lots got completely destroyed.
http://news.163.com/15/0813/05/B0SHAQS000014SEH.html#p=B0SRSU8F00AP0001
VW will love it as they are all insured, insurance companies, not so much.
the explosion must not have been all that because those buildings and other structures are still standing. thank goodness there were no jet fuels involved because that whole city would be gone. poof!
If only someone at the People's Daily had a bit of a sense of humor and blamed it on a sneak attack my the Japanese to stunt China's economic growth - I can only imagine the public's reaction.
You never know what they'll find at the scene. Foreign passports especially are known to survive explosions and ensuing fire. They're tougher than buildings made of steel.
I suspect that a local warehouse was hit by Yiddish Lightning, God helping some poor Chinese company to collect insurance money on non existent inventory, likely used to secure margin loans to speculate in the Shanghai markets.
Unfortunately, God was in a bad mood and may have over reacted.
Either that or the idiot(s) that started the fire lost control with subsequent horrifying results.
Chinese generally don't buy insurance. Many I know consider it bad luck to contemplate misfortune in the future, even as a preventative or palliative measure.
So, no "pull it", eh?
Port of Tianjin
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Port of Tianjin
Logo of the Port of Tianjin
Location
Country People's Republic of China
Location Tianjin
Coordinates 38°58'33" N 117°47'15" E
Details
Opened 1860 (Port of Tanggu); 1952-10-17 (Tianjin Xingang reopening)
Operated by Tianjin Port Group Ltd
Owned by Tianjin State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission
Type of harbor Deep-water Seaport/Riverport
Land area 121 km2[1]
Size 260 km2 (470 km2 total jurisdictional area)
Available berths 217; Production Berths: 140 (2010)[2]
Employees 20,000 (2008)
Chairman Yu Rumin
UN/LOCODE CNTXG or CNTSN (formerly CNTJP/CNTGU)
World Port Index Number 60190
Nautical Charts 94363/0 (NGA/NIMA); 2653/4 (Admiralty); 11773/4(Chinese)
Statistics
Annual cargo tonnage 500 million tonnes (2013)
Annual container volume 13 million TEU (2013)
Value of cargo 197.249 billion USD (2011)[3]
Passenger traffic 110,000 cruiser passengers (2012)[4]
Annual revenue 21.5 billion RMB (2011)[5]
Net income 1.678 billion RMB (2011)[6]
Website
http://www.ptacn.com
This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.
Coordinates: 38°58?33?N 117°47?15?E
The Port of Tianjin (Tianjin Gang, Chinese: ???; pinyin: ti?nj?n g?ng), formerly known as the Port of Tanggu, is the largest port in Northern China and the main maritime gateway to Beijing. The name "Tianjin Xingang" (Chinese: ????; pinyin: ti?nj?n x?ng?ng; literally: "Tianjin New Port"), which strictly speaking refers only to the main seaport area, is sometimes used to refer to the whole port. The port is on the western shore of the Bohai Bay, centred on the estuary of the Haihe River, 170 km southeast of Beijing and 60 km east of Tianjin city. It is the largest man-made port in mainland China,[7] and one of the largest in the world. It covers 121 square kilometers of land surface, with over 31.9 km of quay shoreline and 151 production berths at the end of 2010.[8]
Tianjin Port handled 500 million tonnes of cargo and 13 million TEU of containers in 2013,[9] making it the world's fourth largest port by throughput tonnage and the ninth in container throughput.[10] The port trades with more than 600 ports in 180 countries and territories around the world.[2] It is served by over 115 regular container lines.[11] run by 60 liner companies, including all the top 20 liners. Expansion in the last two decades has been enormous, going from 30 million tonnes of cargo and 490,000 TEU[12] in 1993 to well beyond 400 million tonnes and 10 million TEU in 2012.[13] Capacity is still increasing at a high rate, with 550–600 Mt of throughput capacity expected by 2015.
The port is part of the Binhai New Area district of Tianjin Municipality, the main special economic zone of northern China, and it lies directly east of the TEDA. The Port of Tianjin is at the core of the ambitious development program of the BNA and, as part of that plan, the port aims to become the primary logistics and shipping hub of North China.
I think there's a port for sale near Athens...
Not at all to minimize the tragedy of this moment for those whose lives have been wiped out.
I'd say this will cause significant problems depending on the location of the blast. If the blast occurred dead center of the port area, then we are talking about a huge impact on global commerce.
If you are a global manufacturer and had cargo waiting to depart, or would be using this port in the next 6-12 months, you are pretty much hosed. The whole area is a total lose, and all infrastructure will need to be rebuild from the ground up.
Bad, bad deal.
pretty scary...
reminds me of Terminator 2
bullish Judgement Day bitchez
If they don't have the entire thing rebuilt in 48 hours I will know the fix was in :)
hey...
it's economic stimulus lol
Damned ISIS.
ISIS demands you bow down to Allah or whatever. We are the current whipping horse, come on Blame us please... pretty please. Oh Fuck it IT was us I tell you, really!! and if you don't understand that ask any one ... we blow shit up.. we are scary and we are designed to make you shit fear and this proves it. We are Omnipotent and the very USA says we are scary shit, ask any one, We fucking rock (as long as there is fear we will exist)
Very similar to the explosion of a wireworks factory in the Netherlands in the year 2000: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gs7wTT8cwbo Watch the entire video, the most violent explosion is at the end. 23 people lost their lives.
"where it gets serious is that a critical component to China's trade infrastructure will likely be disrupted"
Translation: expect higher prices.
Why?
"Iron ore prices dropped to the lowest level since at least 2009 last month"
I've said it before and I'll say it again:
These are not accidents, they are orchestrated disasters to limit supply to set a price floor (at the bare minimum), or so that prices go up.
My prediction:
Now that we're in currency-war mode. Expect many more disasters in China and around the world.
When money printing is not enough: devalue by disaster.
Any rehypothicated materials lost?
By burning away real physical supply they are only accelerating the financial meltdown
Creative destruction. Maybe it's a way of reducing excess inventory.
Never let a thought pass our mind.
Keeping our minds open.
"Police took into custody the head of the company involved, Tianjin Dongjiang Port Rui Hai International Logistics, local authorities said."
Rather, they should have called the CIA and asked if they had anything to do with it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvMFhYMVawk
Yer money's dead
Because I said
Don't need to print
Got bombs and flints
Krugman's da man
Barack says we can
Increase our export$
By blowing some shipping ports
That will delay
Orders all day
Then people will pay
Whatever we say
WWIII
Is all we need
To kill and enslave
Don't run in a cave
Your money is ours
Don't try to save
Devaluing is hard
Reality's feigned
Remember that the company leaders behind te melamine milk incident were put to death.
Personally, I hope there wasn't any chlorine stored in the area because that could feed reactions that produce dioxins, which are especially difficult to clean up, will stick around for decades, and are generally quite toxic.
Timothy McVeigh and the Ryder truck story again?
Hot liquidation. Car sales up in August.
The insurance cos. may love it even more, they can now swing the rates pendulum so far upward due to incompetent analysts charged with allowing those rates, as anyone that has been through hurricanes can attest.
That was my first thought too. Can I also interject that China lives in it's own toilet?
Like the Tidy Bowl Man?
Thermobaric FOAB delivery from Russia bad handling or sabotage.
Yeah, one has to wonder just what lit this place up. Exceptionally huge, fast detonation. Possibly a ruptured LP storage tank, but if so was a huge, huge catastrophic failure that did not ignite immediately. Looks like a MOAB x10 or as you speculate a Fuel/Air bomb.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermobaric_weapon
SIS have said they did it , death to infadells.
Chinfidels.
44 deaths = GDP of 7.1%
Now tell us the truth because we, on Zero hedge can handle the truth and often espouse it
last check, 15,355 read this thread.
Just how many you had in mind of we, on ZH?
a few hundred, perhaps?
The rest of them, listen to
'A Few Good Men" Jack yelling:
"You want the truth? You can't handle the turth!"
Head back in sand.
Hoo Lee Fook!
Sum tin wong!
Ho, Fuk, Sun, and Ting would make more sense because it phoenetically more accurately fits both your English and Mandarin intent
Wi Go Bang
Sum Ting Pow
Hung Lo No Mor
Will ZH report on the 152 attacks from Russian troops on Ukraine forces? Or the russian general in charge of Debaltseve, Donetsk airport, Georgia 2008, Chechnya 1999, back in Eastern Ukraine? Or the rebels cancelling all permissions? Or the DPR leaders saying ``Ukraine will fall, the battle has started``? Or the rusky head of the duma ``predicting`` that something big will go down in Ukraine in August? Or the fact that the ruskies/rebels have 45 000 soldiers in eastern ukraine and 100 000+ more waiting on the border (can be ready in 48-72h)?
All this while those dumbasses politicians in Europe and the US are on vacation? What timing!
IDK. ZH isn't reporting on the 80-120 attacks my the Ukies on the Novorussians DAILY either.
get the hell out troll
They need your immediate firepower help, put down that computer and grab that weapon, son. Do not expect help from this crowd, if you sleep with political dogs, you get fleas, fevers, plagues, etc.
My advice is to just say.....fug it.
Crazy. Very sad.
An extremely heavy explosion. I wonder what it was?
And, these are not hub cabs, they are aluminium rims. That is a different issue. And the fire of the car was most likely responsible for that.
That melt on the floor was from the brake calliper, the rim of the alloy wheel was destroyed by mechanical action, something hard hit it, jagged edges = no melt.
Wile-E, yes you are correct that the caliper had effectively been burnt off and fell to the ground. However, there was enough of it left remaining to perhaps only account for the pool of molten alloy immediately in front of it. The principally iron disk brake was still intact.
The other three pools of molten alloy would, I think, be the remains of the rim. The jagged edges would be as a result of an explosive event (maybe relatively cool brake fluid being sprayed on the hot rim when the caliper was being burnt off?), and I suspect that the other three distinct molten pools are the remains of the exploded alloy wheel.
Anyway, truly a fucking huge fire event. This is a terrible tragedy.
Yes you are right about the caliper, the fact it is on the floor means whatever it was attached to is now gone, don't most cars now have aluminum suspension parts?
Wile-E, yes, correct again, most modern cars have aluminum or other alloy brake calipers, and the really expensive ones have titanium etc.
Reasonably (expensive) modern cars do indeed have aluminum suspension componentry. I really don't know what has happened in this photograph, but pounds to peanuts the alloy wheel has exploded for some reason under application of extreme heat.
My best guess? A shitload of heat in a very short time-frame. A tragedy if it was not a terrorist incident.
Brake calipers are made of steel iron mix not alloy they will not melt at low temps. the wheel would of melted way before the caliper.
I saw a gasoline delivery truck (18 wheeler) go up in flames on the side of the PA Turnpike a few years back. No explosions but the heat coming off it was intense. 200 yards away it was still hot as hell. I was taking pictures with my cell phone. Everyone was- there was nowhere to go and nothing else to to but wait until it burned out.
The aluminum body of the tanker and the aluminum wheels on the trailer MELTED and created large pools of liquid aluminum. It was freaky- looked like liquid mercury running across the road.
I was burning a 4 ft pile of leaves 12 feet from the house when the siding almost melted, yeah fire is hot.
Sorry, you are both wrong on caliper. That's a single piston slider design that is forged or cast iron for necessary strength. The piston within caliper I would guess, typically aluminum composition is the likely source of the puddle. If that's what you meant then we agree.
Yes! You are exactly correct! "the heat was so intense it melted hub caps:"
What arrant nonsense - the fucking tyres had burnt away, and the melted alloy component had dribbled onto the ground! This is seriously fierce heat, and I am stunned that only 44 poor fuckers lost their lives, given the area of destruction around Ground Zero.
Those numbers are "official", they are as true as their GDP growth and Gold reserve numbers
Thermite?
lol...holograms.
Jet fuel cant melt aluminum rims.
It can melt massive IBeams and turn concrete to powder!
yeah... reminds me of that freak gasline fight accident...
https://youtu.be/_SSbFjK_gnY
Krugman lives for this shit.
21 tonnes TNT ? More like 15 KT. This was not conventional. Just wondering about time and place, huh?
Nuclear Power Plant
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-A-F/China--... - Location of China's nuclear power plants here
Was this a nuclear bomb or a nuclear power plant exploding?
http://www.scmp.com/news/china-insider/article/1849157/nuclear-bomb-apoc...
Drone captures images of devastation on video inside link right above.
Huang Shiting
Really
Another Huang bites the dust
"Police took into custody the head of the company involved, Tianjin Dongjiang Port Rui Hai International Logistics, local authorities said."
The rule of law still exists in China.
Same people who were occupied arresting shorts last week.
You might be on to something. Maybe the shorts were being warehoused nearby pending mock trials.
Wow. I wish police would take our criminal executives into custody. We could use some of that rule of law here.
This is the deregulation so many pine for "to make US more competitive."
Yeah, because there have never been any huge explosions here thanks to our highly regulated economy. Sometimes shit just happens, and you have no clue what happened there.
I can see virtually every company of importance in the western world migrate to China within the coming decades and abandoning the west for good. Yes, competition is a real thing. The US will become the new africa.
Even if large trade barriers are put in place and globalization is shut down, the companies will move to Asia. The workers will go there, the customers will be there, the money and suppliers will be there. There is not a single "fundamental" advantage for an average company to be located in a non competitive country.
In an office building inside the area was a vault with China's true economic figures...
I read that the power was estimated around 21.000kg TNT.
21 TON.
The bomb on hiroshima was about 15K TON, 15.000 TON
Tsar Bomba in the 1960 100M TON, 100.000.000 TON
That is 100.000.000 TON vs. 21 TON in tianjin
Now imagine a nuclear war.
Random99... sorry you don't get a say. Just wait, they will tell you after it happens and blame it on provocation.
Couldn't China just trot out and over-expose a narcissistic, megalomaniacal tranny like they do here in America to distract the masses? Call me Cait. Call me Kwan.
My first thgought when I heard about this yesterday was espionage and who do you thing would do such a thing with all these currency devaluations and planes going missing?
Perhaps tfj's?
If what you say has an inkling… look for retaliation soon.
that sucks. hopefully the usa will offer help and condolences.
Aide from the U.S always seems to come with some sort of strings attached.
i doubt they would accept help from anyone. a mere platitude will suffice.
Pray for them. It's the least you can do.
We could order Chinese for everyone!
Hugo Chavez refused to accept help from the US navy to evacuate a flooded coastal city back in 1999. "I'd rather let them die" he said.
Just like the X-ians. LOL
Want food?
Aide from the U.S. always seems to come with some sort of missile attached.
Perhaps it was a Silverstein property with an asbestos problem.
I think they are under-reporting the dead by a factor of 100. All those cars, trucks, buildings simply demolished.
had the same thought
Nonsense, according trusted government officials, most of the people were on subsidized vacations at Mao's World as part of their 15 week holiday entitlement per year in the wonderful nirvanic, Peoples "Republic" of China.
Chinese citizens are counted in units of one thousand.
You are correct. I would imagine thousands of dead and wounded.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgurTdK0PTA
Muslim terrorists retaliating for chinese supression of Muslim minorities in China
Or more likely ZIA terrorists retaliating against China for falling out of lockstep in the fiat circus.
I am sure this was just a tragic accident. The CIA sends its deepest condolences....
That spaced based laser really works.
I wish we could see fotos of that ammo dump explosion in North Korea .... remember ?
The TV is showing some fair and honest video.
Why are fence poles surrounding the migrant worker housing? LOL
Never buy those stupid alloy rims .... they melt in chem explosions, weigh more. less tensile strength, cost way more. more expensive tire repairs, ugly, thief magnets .... the stamped steel rim .... best invention ever !
Don't often agree with you monetas, but I'm with you on that one.
Also alloy wheels don't seem to seal as well. There's always one wheel that need regular attention I find.
Is there any real advantage over steel?
http://albainternazionale.blogspot.it/2015/08/cooperazione-energetica-tr...
Krugman says this is bullish...
Hey its a china barbeque, I'll have the Gen Tso chicken
Deep fried in toxic chemical cocktail.
One way to resolve the channel stuffing by GM!
Big Boom in Big China.