American Marconi Wireless News - Major blast at south Iran port injures hundreds

State media reported a "massive explosion" at Shahid Rajaee, the country's largest commercial port, located in Hormozgan province on Iran's southern coast.

Footage broadcast on state television showed thick columns of black smoke billowing from the port area, where many containers are stored, with helicopters deployed to fight the fire.

Citing local emergency services, state TV reported that at least 516 people were injured and "hundreds have been transferred to nearby medical centres", revising earlier tolls.

"The explosion occurred in a part of the Shahid Rajaee port dock, and we are extinguishing the fire," state TV quoted Esmaeil Malekizadeh, a regional port official, as saying.

The customs office at the port said in a statement carried by state TV that the cause of the blast was probably a fire that broke out at the hazmat and chemical materials storage depot.

Shahid Rajaee, more than 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) south of the capital Tehran, is the most advanced container port in Iran, according to the official IRNA news agency.

It is located 23 kilometres west of Bandar Abbas, the Hormozgan provincial capital, and north of the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of world oil output passes.

As emergency services dispatched rapid response teams to the port, First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref ordered an investigation to determine the cause of the blast and assess the extent of the damage, according to the ISNA news agency.

Mehrdad Hassanzadeh, head of Hormozgan province's crisis management authority, told state TV that "the cause of this incident was the explosion of several containers stored in the Shahid Rajaee Port wharf area".

"We are currently evacuating and transporting the injured to nearby medical centres," he said.

The explosion was so powerful that it could be felt and heard some 50 kilometres away, Fars news agency reported, with residents saying they could feel the ground shake even at a distance.

"The shockwave was so strong that most of the port buildings were severely damaged," Tasnim news agency reported.

The state-owned National Iranian Oil Products Distribution Company said in a statement carried by local media that "the explosion at Shahid Rajaee Port has no connection to refineries, fuel tanks, distribution complexes or oil pipelines".

It added that "Bandar Abbas oil facilities are currently operating without interruption".

The rare explosion comes several months after one of Iran's deadliest work accidents in years.

The coal mine blast in September, caused by a gas leak, killed more than 50 people in Tabas in Iran's east.

The blast also came as delegations from Iran and the United States were meeting in Oman for high-level talks on Tehran's nuclear programme.

A.Malone--AMWN