The Hidden Dimensions of a Disaster
The Hidden Dimensions of a Disaster
The explosion at Rajaee Port in Bandar Abbas claimed many lives, caused extensive damage, and, alongside all this, affected the water and soil.
Many reports have been published about the lost lives, displacements, and unemployment, but less attention has been paid to what happened to the coast, sea, and its water and soil.
The source of the explosion is still unclear, and it is unknown where the pollution of 36,000 cubic meters of soil, as announced by the Environmental Protection Organization, originated from.
It is unknown whether the source of the explosion contained sulfate and nitrogen pollutants or if the explosion of shrimp, rice, and tea containers created such conditions. This is a field report from the affected area in Bandar Abbas.
Previous reports focused on the victims, surviving workers, and those who went to help the affected, and now the important issue is the pollution status, disruption of the natural cycle, and the fleeing of animals, an issue that received less attention.
About a month after the disaster at Rajaee Port in Bandar Abbas, the Director General of the Marine Ecosystems and Coastal Protection Office of the Environmental Protection Organization reported that the main reason for the incident was the storage of flammable and explosive materials, highlighting the non-compliance with storage, transportation standards, lack of employee training, and zoning of the Rajaee Port complex.
However, this report still does not mention the source of the explosion and the pollutants that potentially caused the spread of pollution to water, soil, and air.
One of the few quantitative and qualitative data mentioned in this report was the announcement of pollution of 36,000 cubic meters of soil.
Ali Moridi, former Director General of the Water and Soil Office of the Environmental Protection Organization, considers the creation of pollution certain but believes that without identifying the source of the pollution, further steps cannot be taken. Anything that leads to air pollution and introduces pollutants into the environment will undoubtedly cause water and soil pollution as well, because following air pollution, unintended digestion or sedimentation occurs, which means the entry of the same pollutants into water and soil.
Right now, Tehran is experiencing exactly such a situation, meaning the water and soil of Tehran become polluted due to the severe air pollution occurring.
Now, to determine the intensity and extent of this pollution seeped into water and soil, it is necessary to identify the pollutant and the source of the explosion.
For example, if the explosion source is a chemical substance, the severity of destruction and pollution will certainly be greater and more intense.
If the source of the fire and explosion is particulate matter, the intensity of pollution leakage to other environments will be less.
Therefore, to know to what extent we should be concerned about the health and pollution status of water and soil, we need to know the source of the explosion.
According to the published report, only several tons of tea, rice, and shrimp containers were mentioned, while these were not the cause of the explosion but rather caught fire themselves.
The important point is whether the source of that massive explosion contained sulfate or nitrogen pollutants or not.
According to him, the process of extinguishing the fire is also recognized as one of the aggravating factors of pollution. The foams from firefighting equipment that enter the air, if not properly managed, can themselves turn into a contaminating liquid.
He stated that it was necessary for the Environmental Protection Organization to explain how they reached this number. The Soil Protection Law and monitoring the soil status after incidents such as pollutant leaks and explosions were passed during my tenure at the Environmental Protection Organization and were indeed considered very important and serious laws.
The simplest reason is that if subsequent monitoring and inspections do not occur and the dangerous factors present in the soil are not examined, with the first rainfall, all that pollutant will spread significantly in the environment and penetrate the deepest layers of the soil.
Regarding this report, it should also be explained how they arrived at the figure of 36,000 cubic meters of pollution because to calculate pollution, the surface must be multiplied by the depth, but this report does not provide an explanation about this and only introduces a number that is unclear based on what surface and depth it was calculated.
He stated that soil cleanup is an important issue that should be prioritized because soil holds national value in all countries, and its cleanup is of special importance with various methods available.
In Iran, the commonly used method is collection.
In this way, the surface soil is collected and transferred to another environment and isolated.
However, there are also chemical and biological methods for soil washing, which, especially after this major incident, are more needed than ever.
Potential Disruption in Bird Fertility
In the past month, perhaps one of the most serious concerns of environmentalists after the explosion at Rajaee Port has been the birds in that area. The impact of this explosion on the region’s ecosystem has both short-term and long-term aspects.
According to Iman Ebrahimi, a bird conservationist, in the short-term impacts, the sound of the explosion has a significant effect on the bird population because birds in most species react very strongly and quickly to sound and leave the area swiftly.
Of course, this impact is not permanent, and they return after a while, but it is equally serious because we are in a season when birds are breeding, and this loud noise can drive away birds that have laid eggs or chicks, resulting in the complete loss of a breeding cycle.
Because when they return, these eggs and chicks are gone. However, the long-term impact of this explosion sound is related to the severe pollution entering the air and sea water because this sound does not end with itself, and monitoring these long-term pollutions is very challenging.
For instance, many chemical substances resulting from such an incident can affect the fertility of many vertebrates, including birds, and this is an event we do not understand.
This is where the value of long-term and continuous monitoring becomes more apparent.
Being able to compare various statistics over different years and, after filtering out various factors and variables, understand what impact such an explosion has had on the population of different animal species is a difficult and important task.
According to Ebrahimi, Rajaee Port is located at a very ecologically important point because it is between Qeshm Island and the mainland, and over the years, it has caused serious general damage to the region’s ecosystem. This port, due to its proximity to the mangrove forest, also holds special importance.
Moreover, the largest mangrove forest in Iran, known as Khorkhoran, and the largest mangrove forest in Iran are also located in this area.
From an international perspective, Khorkhoran is of great importance due to its size, shape, and water temperature, which is lower due to the shallower water depth, creating its unique ecosystem conditions. One of the most serious problems in this environment is related to the discharge of ballast tanks.
Ballast tanks are present in all ships and are filled and emptied with water to regulate the ship’s immersion in water and create balance, as well as optimize fuel consumption.
However, the problem is that these tanks are often filled in another country, for example, on the coasts of the Indian subcontinent or South America, and then these ships come to Rajaee Port for unloading and loading, and at this point, they need to balance their tanks, resulting in the discharge of ballast tank water, which comes from another part of the world and is full of various animal species, including fish, invertebrates, and shrimp to algae.
All of these suddenly enter the Persian Gulf ecosystem, and this ecosystem, which is a specific area itself, can have each of these species become invasive and affect the entire region’s biological cycle.
Ebrahimi believes that the explosion at Rajaee Port drew attention to this region and its ecosystem. Another issue is the lack of monitoring and oversight that at least shows us how much this has happened so far. It can be said that monitoring and oversight have been carried out in the Persian Gulf ecosystem and invasive species have been identified.
However, determining how many species with which families and with what impact are present requires field studies. Of course, due to the proximity to Khorkhoran, this damage can be even more severe.
The very existence of Rajaee Port, in the absence of environmental monitoring, has long posed serious threats to the environment, and the explosion drew more attention to this region than before.
The Risk of Dolphin and Whale Stranding
Examining the effects of this explosion on the region’s ecosystem requires more precise investigations. Nevertheless, Nazanin Mohsenian, a marine mammal researcher, is concerned about the damage such an explosion could cause to dolphins and whales and says that in such crises, the human priority is often so high and disastrous that issues like monitoring marine animals such as dolphins and whales, which is my area of expertise, become forgotten topics.
To date, no specialized report or monitoring on these animals has been conducted or announced, but based on previous knowledge, we can discuss them.
For instance, it is evident that the entry of chemical and oil pollution into the sea directly enters the bodies of fish, and since these creatures are the food of large marine mammals, the pollution enters the bodies of whales and dolphins, leading to skin damage and various diseases in these animals and, in some cases, negatively affecting their reproduction process.
According to her, noise pollution should also be considered. Noise pollution resulting from such explosions or maneuvers causes animals to strand. These animals have a high ability to receive high and low frequencies, and this issue causes the sound of the explosion to affect their echolocation or location finding.
They become confused following the noise from these events and mistakenly head towards the shore during low tide and become stranded.
If it is summer and until six hours later when the tide rises again, their skin gets damaged and blisters. In these conditions, if the forehead area, which plays a role in location finding, gets damaged, they cannot return to the sea.
Noise pollution from the explosion also causes their migration. The subsequent damage from such noise, oil, and chemical pollution directly shows itself on animal migration.
Because animals are always looking to live in a safer place without tension and with higher food resources, and after such tension, they migrate and leave the area. This is all while serious protective measures for animals are considered worldwide. Unfortunately, there is a lack of monitoring, rapid sampling, and transparent information in this area, especially regarding marine mammals.
In contrast, we see significant projects being implemented worldwide. For example, the Silent Ocean project has been in effect for a long time globally, striving to maintain the calm and tranquility of the ocean for its inhabitants and keep the routes of whales and dolphins safer.
Efforts have even been made to allocate busy crossing areas to marine mammal work areas and change the shipping corridors, which is not an easy task.
According to officials, despite the high volume of damage, the explosion at Rajaee Port did not disrupt the water and electricity supply process for the people. However, during this incident, the 100,000 cubic meter desalination plant and the Bandar Abbas power plant were severely damaged.
Although, according to the Director General of the Crisis Management and Passive Defense Office of the Ministry of Energy, water and electricity industry colleagues returned these vital facilities to the grid in the shortest possible time.
Seyfollah Aghabeygi explained that in the water sector, all alternative capacities, including wells and defensive water supply facilities in the region, were used with maximum possible capacity to prevent drinking water problems in the shortest possible time.
However, this crisis once again brought up the issue of inappropriate placement of desalination plants. It is evident that water management in Iran by relying on rainfall is practically impossible in the current drought situation, and desalination plants are needed. However, this incident may show that near a port the size of Rajaee, which is a center for the transfer of oil and refinery materials, and with tankers and various vessels circulating around it, may not be suitable for placing desalination plants.
Because with any incident like a fuel leak or this explosion, these devices can become contaminated or damaged.
For this reason, desalination plants are immediately shut down after such incidents. According to experts, each cubic meter of desalinated water costs Iran between six to eight-tenths of a euro, so protecting it is important both economically and for providing drinking water to the people.
Even now, due to the lack of a large industry around the Sea of Oman and its suitability from an environmental perspective, it is considered a better place for desalination plants, especially around Jask and Chabahar.