Characteristics of open eye injuries in the Beirut Port explosion

Analysis of ocular injury 1-year outcome in survivors of Beirut Port ammonium nitrate blast

“…Most people’s eyes were injured by glass shrapnel and debris. Two previous reports on the Beirut blast mentioned in great detail the large number of difficulties during the acute management of suturing the ocular wounds in a major general hospital (American University of Beirut; 6 cases) [ 2 ] and the short-term results in EEI (31 cases) [ 3 ], while the current report details the 1-year outcomes in 29 patients of the originally treated 42 patients with penetrating ocular injuries (among the 48 total cases of sutured lacerations as reported to the Lebanese Ophthalmic Society) [ 2 ].…”

“…The general setup in 1917 included chloroform anesthesia and topical cocaine anesthesia, operating with the naked eye under the light of a bulb, use of commercially available silk sutures, and operating over a period of 4 days by a general eye ear nose throat practitioner. In the Beirut disaster a century later, 14,000 were injured, 219 died [ 1 ], 48 subjects underwent ocular surgery, and 4 received immediate enucleations (8.3%) [ 2 , 3 ]. The general setup included development of better instrumentation (operating microscope, vitrector, phacoemulsification, intraocular lens, intraocular magnet and forceps), smaller sutures with needles, use of viscoelastics, and prompt surgical management by vitreoretinal fellowship-trained ophthalmologists well trained in trauma management.…”

“…A consignment of an estimated 2750 tons of discretely and unsafely stored ammonium nitrate (AN) (NH 4 NO 3 ) in the warehouse facility of the port of Beirut exploded at 6:05 pm on August 4, 2020, destroying a large part of the capital of Lebanon, killing 218, wounding some 14,000 people [ 1 ], and leaving around 300,000 residents homeless [ 2 , 3 ]. Wounded individuals were rushed to still-functional hospitals (those that did not sustain major structural damage), which in turn became severely overcrowded in 2 h. The blast lofted a white mushroom cloud over the Lebanese capital with two million inhabitants and is considered the most severe anthropological disaster of the decade with a consequent direct and indirect financial and economic loss edging 10 billion US dollars [ 1 – 3 ]. The Beirut Port explosion traumatized the living population after a series of political unrest, COVID-19 outbreak, security challenges, and unprecedented economic collapse, transforming Lebanon from a functioning nation to a failing one.…”

“…Most of the literature have dealt with the immediate human bodily injuries and economic aftermath of collapsed historic buildings [ 1 – 3 ]. Except for a few reports [ 4 – 10 ], publications on major nuclear or major non-nuclear disasters did not focus on ocular injuries, and those that did tackled only the acute phase.…”

High strain rate characterisation of soda-lime-silica glass and the effect of residual stresses

“…Not considering such load cases in the glass design might have fatal consequences. For instance, in the unfortunate event of an explosion, such as the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995 (USA) and the Beirut Port explosion in 2020 (Lebanon), it has been shown that numerous injuries and often deaths can be attributed to flying or falling glass shards (Norville et al 1999;Rudick and Norville 2000;Sukkarieh et al 2021). Therefore, mitigating an explosion's effects is crucial.…”