This is the shocking explosion that rocked Beirut, Lebanon on August 4, 2020.

Dusky red air hangs over the city in the wake of the explosion as firefighting teams rushed to the scene to try to put out the fire. The city's governor, Marwan Abboud, said at the time that the scene reminded him of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, referencing the two cities hit by atomic bombs by the United States in World War II.

Local bicycle shop owner Karim Sokhn captured the heart-stopping moment, telling Newsflare his store was severely damaged.

“They’ve evacuated us and we have no access now,” Sokhn told Newsflare at the time.

In a phone interview with Newsflare on the day of the blast, he described what happened: "I was in the bike shop fixing a bicycle. There was a first explosion. I went out and I thought there was a lot of smoke. When I took my phone to film, to capture the moment, the moment I pressed record, the second blast went out. All i remember is falling and a wave of dust hit.

"Then I was in shock for five minutes.

"I did not know what was going on. I heard hundreds of screaming people, all over - screams and screams. It was shocking. I called my dad, told him there was an explosion in Beirut, I told him I was fine and then hung up. It's like a war zone here.

"It felt like when the second blast happened, the air was sucked up - you feel like the air is being sucked up and then you hear the blast. My ears felt blocked. I heard windows shattering all over the place, it's crazy."

Explosion in Beirut

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Explosion