By SINA GHANBARPOUR

IranWire

Orange smoke billowed into the sky above Bandar Abbas on Saturday as explosions rocked Shahid Rajaee Port, Iran’s largest commercial maritime gateway.

The ominous clouds immediately drew comparisons to the catastrophic Beirut port explosion of August 2020.

They raised urgent questions about storing hazardous materials and safety protocols at major shipping facilities.

As officials scrambled to contain the damage and investigate the cause, the incident became the latest in a troubling pattern of industrial disasters across Iran, where lessons from past disasters appear unheeded.

Assessment of the explosion’s effects in the container storage area has been postponed until the fire is completely extinguished.

Sources in Bandar Abbas and workers familiar with the special economic zone told IranWire that the extent of the damage far exceeds what has been shown in published images.

Babak Mahmoudi, head of the country’s Rescue and Relief Organization, said, “The explosion was so intense that it caused windows to break within the port area, which has led to an increase in injuries and casualties.”

The flat terrain of Shahid Rajaee Port, combined with tightly packed containers and equipment, likely caused the explosion debris to spread outward in all directions, resulting in widespread damage across the facility.

The explosion occurred as Iran and the U.S. were engaged in talks in Muscat, prompting suspicions of sabotage or a terrorist attack.

Experts say that smoke from burning nitrogen dioxide and nitric acid is yellow and orange, turning brown at higher temperatures, just like what witnesses saw at the port.

The harmful effects of inhaling these fumes are permanent, making the health risks even more urgent.

The exact location and cause of the initial explosion remain unclear, with officials providing contradictory and vague statements.

Early reports from the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) attributed the disaster to an ammonia tank explosion, only to later retract this claim and suggest it began with the explosion of a cargo container whose contents were unknown.

Initial media reports placed the incident in the Sina container operations area, a facility near the central dock operated by the Sina Marine and Port Services Development Company, a subsidiary of the Mostazafan Foundation.

This would locate the explosion in the western part of the port.

However, aerial footage has complicated this narrative, showing black smoke rising from three distinct points across the facility.

Videos documenting the destruction of both the Shahid Rajaee Protection Unit Permit Issuance building in the eastern section and the customs building in the port's center have made it difficult to pinpoint the explosion’s origin.

An employee of a transportation company that regularly stores containers at the port told IranWire, “Our colleagues who do fieldwork have been involved in the incident, and we still don’t have an accurate assessment of which area it occurred in."

“But since, according to classification, the storage location for containers carrying flammable and dangerous materials is separate from other containers, we know that the starting point was in that area.”

The source expressed confusion about why refrigerated container storage areas were also burning, suggesting that the fire may have spread beyond its initial containment zones.

Authorities imposed tighter control on information three hours after the explosion.

The Crisis Management Organization designated the governor of Hormozgan and the province’s Crisis Management Director as the sole official sources for updates, instructing others not to comment.

The Prosecutor General warned against spreading “false information.”

A government spokesperson urged caution, saying, “Regarding the cause of the incident, we must wait for the necessary expert assessments,” and asked the media to "refrain from speculative opinions.”

President Masoud Pezeshkian ordered the Interior Minister to investigate the explosions. The minister traveled to Bandar Abbas hours after the blast.

The Minister of Roads and Urban Development was also present at the port, and the Speaker of Parliament dispatched a delegation of representatives to investigate the causes.

However, this pattern of high-level visits following disasters has become a troubling precedent in Iran.

Past incidents, such as the Yazd-Mashhad train derailment, the Metropol building collapse, the Gandhi Hospital fire, and the Langarud rehab campfire, prompted ministerial visits but yielded no conclusive investigation results.

As night fell on Saturday, reports indicated that the fire was spreading to additional container storage areas, further delaying any definitive information about the cause.

The orange smoke emanating from Shahid Rajaee Port has drawn immediate comparisons to another infamous Iranian disaster: the February 18, 2004, catastrophe at the Khayyam railway station near Neyshabur.

In that incident, 51 runaway wagons, including 15 carrying sulfur, six with gasoline, 10 with cotton, and seven containing ammonium nitrate, derailed, caught fire, and eventually exploded with a force equivalent to a 3.5-magnitude earthquake.

The Neyshabur disaster claimed 352 lives and injured 469.

First responders, unaware of the wagons’ dangerous contents, attempted to extinguish the initial fire with water, inadvertently creating the conditions that led to the catastrophic explosion.

Davood Rashtchian, a professor of safety and process engineering at Tehran’s Sharif University, said that even years after the Neyshabur incident, “It is not clear what caused it, and no one has yet taken responsibility."

He added, “No data, information, or articles have been published about it."

“We see incidents happening all over the world. They’re not just in our country, but we don’t learn from them or improve our methods.”

The Shahid Rajaee Port explosion joins a disturbing pattern of industrial and infrastructural disasters in Iran that have failed to produce systemic safety reforms.

After the Plasco building collapse, the then-president ordered Tarbiat Modares University to prepare a national report, but the recommendations failed to prevent the subsequent collapse of the Metropol building in Abadan.

The deaths of 19 people at the Sina Athar Shemiran medical center did not prevent later hospital fires at Gandhi Hospital in Tehran and Qaem Hospital in Rasht.

The fire at the Bu Ali Sina Petrochemical facility in Mahshahr Port was never followed by a comprehensive report on its causes or prevention strategies.

These incidents highlight what appears to be a systemic failure to implement safety engineering and Health, Safety, and Environment (HSE) protocols effectively within Iran’s industrial and commercial infrastructure.

The visual similarities between the orange smoke in Bandar Abbas and the smoke from the 2020 Beirut port explosion have not gone unnoticed.

The Beirut disaster was caused by the improper storage of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate, which had been kept in customs without adequate safety measures for six years.

As emergency services continue battling the flames and investigators prepare to assess the damage, there is growing concern among Iranians that the full impact of this disaster has yet to be revealed.