21 August 2015 (00:46 UTC-07 Tango 01)/30 Mordad 1394/06 Dhu al-Qa’dah 1436/08 Jia-Shen (7th month) 4713
Tianjin Lite Rail 9 (aka Subway 9, Line 9, Binhai Mass Transit) was shutdown due to the explosions. It is the main east-west rail line into and out of Binhai, running along the Haihi River. It is not expected to become operational until October.
At the latest news conference a warning of “secondary disasters” was given, due to the massive amounts of volatile chemicals spread over the disaster area. Of note, “explosive metallic sodium” is being found.
It was revealed that Rui Hai International Logistics was stacking chemicals in containers three high, and they were not taking into account what the chemicals were, in other words they were mixing the stacking of containers with chemicals that react violently with each other!
People’s Liberation Army personnel are getting closer to the epicenter of the devastating thermobaric explosions in Binhai district, Tianjin, China. A news crew was allowed to follow one NBC unit as they attempted to find a safe way in.
They avoided puddles of water and smoke as they could contain toxic or corrosive agents. A steel conex box was smoking but it turned out to be hay. At this point Nuclear, Biological, Chemical personnel are limited time-wise by the hot protective suits they wear, one soldier showed signs of heat exhaustion and they had to turn back.
This brings us to a fine example of how big the blast area is. Satellite pics show a crater that is 1-hundred meters (328 feet) in diameter. It’s filled with 50-thousand metric tons of water from the fire fighting efforts and the recent rain. Testing of the water shows it’s contaminated with sodium cyanide, 40 times what is considered “normal”.
“The concentration of all pollutants that we monitor has been the within national standards since August 16th. All the water that has been found containing cyanide has been collected and will not be discharged until it passes the test, cyanide pollution within the danger area is still serious but outside it is basically safe except for some rainwater pipelines. Offshore, there is no significant change in the concentration of cyanide in the sea water compared to the past year. It’s all within the national standard.”-Tian Weiyong, Ministry Of Environmental Protection
Despite the claims that ocean water is safe, there are reports (and pics) of thousands of dead fish washing up on beaches near the blast area. However, those fish are not coming from the ocean but from the Haihi River. Government administrators explained that such die-offs are normal during summer, as hot temps allow algae blooms which suffocate fish.
To find out if incompetent handling of volatile chemicals has become the norm, the Chinese government began surprise inspections of ports and chemical companies across the mainland. So far 2-hundred violations of safety standards has been documented, several operations have been shutdown. Apparently allowing ‘communist’ companies to adopt ‘western’ corporate ways of doing business results in massive safety problems.
U.S. farm vehicle maker Deere has resumed production at its Tianjin factory. This is another fine example of how massive the explosions were, the Deere factory is 9.6 kilometers (6 miles) from the blast zone! Deere administrators say they are still repairing damaged windows and doors. A Deere employee and his wife are still hospitalized.
Proof it was the World’s biggest Thermobaric bomb!
The latest stats:
More than 4-thousand PLA personnel deployed
114 people dead (mainly firefighters, police and warehouse employees)
692 wounded (more than 50 Toyota employees wounded, it could have been more as the majority of Toyota employees had the day off, U.S. farm vehicle maker Deere also reported wounded employees, but refused to give specific numbers)
646 people still hospitalized
number of missing increased to 69
322 rescued
Blast radius 3km
779 buildings damaged or destroyed
1-thousand+ new Toyotas destroyed
1-thousand 5-hundred new Renaults destroyed
2-thousand 7-hundred new VWs destroyed
Evacuation radius 5km
10 hectares (24.7 acres) confirmed contaminated with sodium cyanide
17-thousand families evacuated
30-thousand people directly affected
12 schools and 3 apartment buildings now evacuation shelters