we can speak now 2 of them he's a doctor specializing in infectious diseases a few american university of beirut medical center dr b.c. thank you so much for joining us can you tell us what the situation is right now where you are one of them are. you. ok doctor because we're having a little bit of trouble with the line but could you tell us how hospitals are coping we understand that they're overwhelmed. yes. well the. community. will. be in the pool with. a group. if you're on a. particular. horse. and you. sort of. go to the. right but we still unfortunately having trouble with the lines we're going to leave our conversation there might be straight from the american university of beirut medical center thank you so much for joining us. and we can get some more perspective on this story now we have deep from arabic with us in our studio here among thank you so much for joining us 1st of all you are from lebanon you have family and friends in beirut is everyone ok we've been trying to figure that out since yesterday since the blast just making sure that everyone we know is safe and sound there a

well anyway we spoke to mondo he's a professor of communications of the american university of beirut he told us more about the warehouse where the explosion happened the material is stored it was in the have your number 12 which is one of the biggest and they store all flammable in an order material that is highly sensitive to explosions and otherwise and those who are stuck there by quote touring because they're not allowed to enter lebanon and they were basically trying to get them into lebanon using excuses off using them for fertilizers so the reports so far are saying and it seems that something terribly when drunk there and they were not stored properly there was a lot of flammables and that region and then there was a massive fire followed by in intensity. which basically destroyed the 2 to 30 kilometer radius of homes and houses around i was one of those who who is missing or the glass and an entire entrance to a house because of the blast basically it's negligence you have got the customs department that responsible for it and then you've got the ministry of defense because

joined by a now professor of clinical emergency medicine from the american university of beirut's medicalr. when we spoke a few days ago, you told me you were concerned about a shortage of medical supplies and a lack of what can you tell us about the capacity in hospitals to be able to continue treating patients? thank you for having me. when we talk about capacity of hospital beds, it is about functional capacity, not only physical space. having a bed is not all you need. a needs to be staffff by qualified people, having the capacity to actually provide care, meaning providing medication, qualified help, qualified nursing and medical personnel, qualified investigational studies from labs. care of them if we do not have this tent? it costs to purchase, and our money is evaluated and the country is bankrupt. how can you take care after the attacks, of torn arteries and injuries? correspondent: can i ask you, it has obviously been several days since the explosion. what are you starting to see in hospitals now? are you seeing patients with more serious injuries? receive some cases that obvio

from inside a hot a the the american university of beirut casualties still arriving at hospital 34 hours after the explosion and what sort of strain at the moment. is lebanon's health system on the moment. you know we have a very limited number of i.c.u. beds in lebanon something and then the and the hundreds and the cases of coke would have have gotten to a point where many many of them are taking up those beds and there aren't many beds left and so you know it's like you're going through a crisis you're going through a kind of a pearl harbor and then you get hit again. on top of that so it's you know it's a double triple quadruple whammy on the number of things that are going through into these hospitals have been crying out for help on television for weeks and months now saying that they don't have the p.p. they don't have the protective gear to treat coronavirus patients they can't you know the because the currency has devaluate it so much the cost of care it's still expensive for lebanese citizens but it has no value and when you can we want a hospital you to buy imported goods we d

you now let's go to our panel joining us from beirut we have carmen jihad she's an associate professor of public administration of the university of the american university of beirut enquires austria we have hi cohen who is director of the lebanon project at the international crisis group also in beirut we have journalist welcome to you or comment the question now being asked by many lebanese was this accidental or intentionally set off and i think this is something that might take some time before people would put together all the elements of the puzzle. yeah well 1st thank you for caring to tell the story i know that there's a lot happening in the world right now i want to correct what you said to your guest before me people don't feel abandoned by their state we've you know that we have been taken hostage and we have been taken hostage for the last 30 years i don't want to count the numbers the disaster from last night people are stent picking up their loved ones bodies from under the rubble there are pictures all over of missing family members there are at least 300000 people affected by the bombing housing is destroyed i don't want to tal

they haven't survived the immediate impact of the explosion he was transferred from the american university of beirut medical center to france for treatment where he suck um to his injuries. 2 months later. in february and march 2005 the lebanese military intelligence and in sternal security forces conducted their own investigation and then man a cease of the explosion. from the way in a request from the lebanese prime minister the u.n. secretary general dispatched a fact finding mission to bear root to inquire into the causes the circumstances and the consequences of this assassination the investigation was not conducted according to international standards it was a recent aged disorganized and there was a chaotic approach to the crime scene investigation particularly in the initial period after the explosion the crime scene was not properly secured critical evidence in the form of the vehicles in mr herrera's convoy were removed by the i.s.f. from the crime scene on the very evening of the attack to trucks and other heavy duty vehicles drove on to the crime scene in order to do this the crime scene

that every times thank you so much your time ironically there it's endless professor at american university of beirut thank you. plenty more ahead on the news hour including. france protests at the highest level after the killing of a group of humanitarian workers in. one of the latest on efforts to clean up an oil spill along the coast of more ships. and indians most prolific test ball hits back claims about his future details coming up in sports. the russian protesters are back out on the streets a nice after 3000 were arrested there angry at the reelection of longtime leader alexander lukashenko who has been handed a 6th term he's promised to crack down on anybody disputing the result france germany and the u.k. are urging restraint steadfast and reports from mint sq. explosions rocking the russian capital a few hours after polls have closed a position supporters have come out in thousands to protest the initial election results riot police is blocking the entrance to a large square. and this firing stun grenades into the crowd. a police truck drives into protesters. ambulances are rushing in to t

smoke is actually fuel now that's one way of 'd looking at it then you go to the social media in beirut and you see that of those polls by american university of beirut medical center which is the most important medical facility in the. country and in the middle east which says everybody in lebanon needs to stay indoors from the look of the flame the explosion looks the night of it asset based stay at home and then you go into the medical center and they tell you that it's actually not that opposed the same think about canadian embassy canadian embassies doing headcounts of their stuff but then there are fake oboes from the canadian embassy which were obviously not posted by them because says that it's a drop the bomb with depleted uranium red color. all your loved ones together they don't inhale tried to go opposite direction of where so there is this kind of things which cannot be confirmed in the meantime of course the government is trying to put this finger on the who. who exactly is this sponsible but though this moment it's very difficult to include all. the sides we get into that in just a moment andrea but but as you say you're exac

i spoke to an specialist at the american university of beirut and people are saying to rep casks maskst happened, and - that's happened, and yeah, that's it. decades of corruption and i failing decades of corruption and of failing infrastructure, protests on the streets about this as well in the last few months. how will lebanon cope with this? it will need a lot of international help which really has not been forthcoming, has it recently? the international community has refused to help because of the corruption. in the government has to implement certain reforms on transparency and anti—corruption reforms on transparency and anti—corru ption measures reforms on transparency and anti—corruption measures before they receive any help. i think this is very different because if it is an accident which is what the government is saying, that it's not like the lebanese brought tips on themselves. the international community knows that lebanon needs help even if just community knows that lebanon needs help even ifjust to run the hospitals, this is going to be a huge humanitarian problem here i

of the gulf studies center at qatar university and from boston in the u.s. rami corey senior fellow at the some far as institute at the american university of beirut gentlemen welcome to you all rami let's start with you is the u.s. saudi relationship unraveling what are we to make of the state department's comments. the relationship is definitely in a serious process of transition and change after 75 years or so of pretty strong. stability in which direction it goes is going to depend on how the saudis behave and it's going to depend on how political winds in the united states change as well particularly in the congress and especially in the white house the saudi u.s. relationship now is very very narrow in terms of its links to the white house and particularly to cushion around trump and individually so it's a very send relationship compared to what it used to be before but it is definitely in a moment of historic change and it it could get better it could get worse depends on how people behave but chips wary here in doha what about the state department comments what do you make of that you know at the end of the day i think there was political pressure t

now to massai who is an expert in islamist groups and political science professor at the american university of beirut she joins us now on the line from there could have you with us professor where were you when this explosion hit yesterday. i thought. i mean. 'd something like this. once you realized that it was an explosion that caused it what we are what we are national force then. something big. check. sure response i think. for most people. was. destroyed. the prime minister has declared a national day of mourning. wednesday. what do you think will be the impact on the country of this explosion. already is going through maybe the toughest time in its history the state is about to collapse the economy is already. bad. people all. of the people are out there just. increasing the. ringback funding or the exchange rate dollar. lebanese is going to help but wonder. what today is going to lead to massive school people go and i think the government this day just to remind you that you. are one is. the most gracious. because because of the fires that took place among. the government could not. help cours

and we speak now to mocked oh he's a professor of communications at the american university of beirut and was a former candidate for the lebanese parliament thanks very much indeed for being with us so the prime minister has talked about the. explosion being caused by possibly dangerous materials that was stored in the port and had been there since 2014 can you explain just what kind of oversight there is a of the port and how that kind of material might have been there for for so long in such a densely populated area. the material is stored it was in the have your number 12 which is one of the biggest and they store all flammable and that order material that is highly sensitive to explosions and otherwise and those who are stuck there by quota touring because they're not allowed to enter lebanon and they were basically trying to get them into lebanon using excuses off using them for fertilizers so that the ports so far are saying and it seems that something terribly when drunk there and they were not stored properly there was a lot of flammables and that region and then there was a m

makdisi is a founding director of the public policy and international affairs program at the american university of beirut a welcome to you all i want to start with you karim some of the things i've been hearing from lebanese friends here in doha through my interaction with lebanese people across the world and in lebanon itself. off is that they're all corrupt they're all thieves this is a criminal at that there's no hope anything for lebanon crema how do you get to a position where seemingly most of your population is so anti any public institution because they've been failed so many times how does that happen well and it happens over a very long time it's been happening over at least 3 decades since the end of the civil war from there any amount in one piece on with something day and it's been a slow demise it's a bit like the problem boiling and you know just continues to boil slowly slowly slowly until it's too late and it's cooked and i think this is i mean this is the short answer it's becoming for 3 decades. i don't share and a lot of people will start thing what with blaming everybody blame the pe

who's chair of the refugees initiative at the american university of beirut he was a fair distance away from the city at the time of the blast but was still by the blast wave. really really very very very nice and i haven't seen. the civil war and lebanon israeli invasion descent as a summation but this is i think the biggest explosion that happened in lebanon up to my you know experience or knowledge i was outside beirut. not far from beirut but overlooking it and we were shaken. and actually we've heard seconds before some kind of an air jet over the sound of a messed up. again another expert. we've heard for a couple of seconds something like like a stone down then when the bomb and from the images that. the damages are huge and the forest area i think the whole force idea might have been. you know demolished altogether and the radius of the explosion by talking to a relative. clauses were broken and the radius of 20 kilometers from the from the. so we don't understand yet. what happened but this is going to be huge and great. and we just pray that not many casualties. will be lost o

else's either they vote i mean katz is a professor of clinical emergency medicine at the american university of beirut medical center is fighting me about what the past few days have been like for him i actually went to the 830 with a picture of a young man was 30 years old looking for him in the 8 bodies with me where i unidentified you know all more and i found him here the small beard that's what we really did not do nice to him then i had to call his mom i can tell you i've took 30 years in the field after all the mass casualties of this i've seen it i still have an awful plain time nightmares thinking about this mother was holding on to my scrubs and telling me what couldn't you save my son i mean you know. kids that we just lost a day of for you all for you all today was announced that she passed away there the image of this mother telling me how could i not save her son or my colleagues because with a team we lost anywhere between 12 and 20 people during that night and we saved many others but but this is a story or happens in every emerges that department. now at least 17 people have been kill

of atmospheric chemistry or the director of the center for nature conservation at the american university of beirut she joins us now live via skype from beirut good to have you with us professor what was your reaction when you heard that such a vast quantity of ammonium nitrate was being stored so close to the city. first it's close to the 2nd it's in the midst of a high relative humidity. and it's also next to many chemicals that are usually and frequently importuned in the harbor so they're need in the lids those ammonium nitrate toward. by itself is a hunter a very dangerous environment so how should a modem nitrates have been being stored. usually a morning when i take it hygroscopic material that means it absorbs water tight and to be humidity and shouldn't be stored at low would have to be humidity it is an explosive material so it should be stored in containers that usually are tested for a blast proof and frequently checked through or for compliance with with those safety safety measures but is it a material that degrades over time becomes more unstable or was this just an accident waiting

as it has no diplomatic relations with lebanon well nasa yassin is a professor at the american university of beirut he says he doubts the government will be able to deal with this disaster on it so. like many issues for the last few months we've been seeing the revenues government not taking the right decisions when it comes to managing the economy or the finances or social issues and they can imagine that this disaster this catastrophe will be dealt by the way that live in these people do relying on themselves on their war on their communities. and the government will just be lost in not giving and not doing the right decision i hope they do things differently this time i hope all the state the government the parliament administration leader look into this and give real answers from people. and the people accountable and i think this this is what we want we need we need more responsible leaders and we need the engagement with that of the international community to deal with this kind of disaster i think this is what's needed you know the measure for this is the major port of beirut that was almost

beirut, every business has been impacted by these massive explosions. the governor estimates 3 to $5 billion of damage. to discuss this, i'm joined by a professor of economics at the american university of beirut. it's a pleasure to have you on, sir. our heart felt condolences for the situation in beirut. this explosion at the port reflects the same mismanagement that has left the economy in crisis. let's be very clear, lebanon cannot afford to pay for the damage itself. the country is broke, correct? >> correct. the country is broke. the commercial banking system is bankrupt. the government is bankrupt. we have been going through a series of crisis factors for the past year and now with the blast things are catastrophic. reconstruction is not going to be possible given where they are at today. >> that suggests lebanon will have to lean very heavily on international support, right? >> i mean, it's our only hope. it's our only rescue. we cannot do it on our own given how bankrupt we are, given where the economy and the financial situation is. i think that dealing with the imf is our only way out given our current situation, crisis of a catastrophic situation. >> and that's been a conv

he's a professor of international politics at american university of beirut. i actually wanted to start with something that you tweeted out on saturday. you said this. "today is about anger against the criminal state apparatus and expression of grief after shock of the port blast and those who died needlessly. tomorrow needs to be to about rebuilding a political strategy and unity so deaths not in vain. no to sectarian division and obvious traps being set." a powerful tweet. i mean, do you have confidence that this tragedy could lead to real political change for the lebanese people? >> yeah, good morning. i think it has great potential. i think you saw yesterday and in previous weeks the mass protests and anger against this kind of political system that we're talking about, and not just this government but successive governments over the past two or three decades that have led to economic collapse, financial collapse, and now just to sum it up this massive blast which really tore apart beirut, has put 300,000 people out of homes, has really devastated people, d

lebanon's coalition government well let's now speak to rami curry who's a professor at the american university of beirut he joins us by skype from boston so rami obviously we've been speaking about what's happened in lebanon and people trying to cope with it but of course it's really i suppose a symptom of a system that has long been broken and riddled by corruption and negligence there was a lot of fieri on the streets of beirut today is that likely to get worse. it's definitely going to get worse to keep this in perspective their sectarian powers or a system worked reasonably well in the middle of the last century there are the great face of nation building state building all across the arab world until around the 1990 s. say the end of the civil war it was most people in lebanon of their lives were getting better broadly speaking and so people were in the room with the system but there is really in the last 25 years that the system has collapsed because it has become very corrupted and it has allowed a lot of external influences from all different parties to to 'd manipulate people 'd in lebanon and

rami khouri, professor of journalism at the american university in beirut, tells "gps" he has a plan to make sure all aid money gets where it is supposed to go. he proposes a competent group of ngos, academics, professionals, and civic leaders to work alongside the government to oversee the fair distribution of the promised aid. he says it would not only rebuild beirut but build back public confidence in lebanon's leaders. sometimes these kind of crises can have the effect of a wake-up call and jolt a country to a change and reform. lebanon desperately needs such a shock to the system.

of all offer to help that includes aid medical teams and search and rescue experts. for more on developments in beirut let's bring in robbie koori who's a journalism professor at the american university of beirut a senior fellow at harvard kennedy school he joins us now via skype from boston rami good to have you with us. before we talk about about the latest develop such as want to get your thoughts having spoken to you so often from beirut on what happened yesterday. this is a development that is a massive humanitarian tragedy some our major urban catastrophe and it is the culmination of political incompetence and cruelty and indifference and corruption that permeates most of the modern arab world not every other countries like the us but i would say 2 thirds of them at least suffer the same kind of problems of top heavy. autocratic. unfit governments and we've seen it now with protests all over the arab world are 2 thirds of the our country's about nonstop protests since 2010 a whole decade of civilian. populist uprisings and so that's the context in which we have to see this this is incredibly dramatic because of the size of the blast the the wreckage of the half of the city and

of the protest movement that began in october but bringing about change won't be easy. beirut i'm now joined by dr i mean kathy a professor of clinical emergency medicine from the american university of beirut medical center and dr when we spoke a few days ago you were telling me you are concerned about a shortage of medical supplies and also a lack of actresses what can you tell us about the capacity and hospitals that it to be able to to continue treating patients. well i can't it was it was like you put out to me when you we talk about capacity of us for the beds it's about function and capacity not only physical space so having a better than that you need to think about that stuff by proper body fight people having the capacity to actually provide care meaning provide them support of providing medication provide them 25 help but if either nursing and medical personnel. qualified in big investigation or studies from the x. they do interventions i mean how can you how can we take it off work to rescue the other day if we don't have the stamps and if the stent disgusting $10000.00 to purchase and our money's evaluated and. the country is bankrupt how can you take care of that doc

rami khouri of the american university of beirut and at the harvard kennedy school.>> up next, tonight's last word and why everyone should care about the new attack on the census by the trump administration. nated by about what's next. and still going for my best. even though i live with a higher risk of stroke due to afib... ...not caused by a heart valve problem. so if there's a better treatment than warfarin, i want that too. eliquis. eliquis is proven to reduce stroke risk better than warfarin. plus has significantly less major bleeding than warfarin. eliquis is fda-approved and has both. what's next? reeling in a nice one. don't stop taking eliquis unless your doctor tells you to, as stopping increases your risk of having a stroke. eliquis can cause serious and in rare cases fatal bleeding. don't take eliquis if you have an artificial heart valve or abnormal bleeding. while taking eliquis, you may bruise more easily- -and it may take longer than usual for any bleeding to stop. seek immediate medical care for sudden signs of bleeding, like unusual bruising. eliqu

blast the private hospitals were already firing employees at the biggest hospital the american university of beirut hospital they fired 850 nurses and administrators just a few weeks ago because they couldn't they could no longer pay them why because people are losing their jobs when they lose their jobs they lose private insurance and they no longer can go to hospitals and it's not just that the cash strapped government it's private hospitals billions of dollars and then you have the public hospitals which are underfunded they've been they collected for decades and so they are struggling and that's why politicians have been calling on countries to send medical assistance and some countries are answering that call you mentioned earlier qatar sending a field hospital other countries are going to follow suit but those who oppose the government critics of the government are appealing to international donors not * to provide aid to the government directly they're saying give give the money give help to the people directly or through n.g.o.s because i can tell you people have lost a lot of faith with th

his leader beirut well let's not speak to rami hariri he's a journalism professor at the american university of beirut and also a senior fellow at the harvard kennedy school he joins us now from new york rami was stuff a deal up until now he's not exactly been a household name and lebanon what kind of a man is he and why him well his prime minister because he's not very well known at all and we don't know what kind of a man hears of that that he's a very distinguished culture decent fellow who has served the various public service capacities in the universities and the military think back at one point and look. he sort of with the prime minister and one point. he doesn't have a public real record. and he grew. traction there so that's why he was appointed because he's a clean slate. people who appointed him were just the 4 sunday prime minister's recent prime ministers or millionaires so that. he would be the one who could quell the popular uprising and make some changes and get the country back on track that's a bit of a gamble and the public doesn't really. that doesn't really have a lot of faith in

beirut. rania spoke to mom who's a professor of communications at the american unit university of beirut and a former candidate for the lebanese parliament he has more details on what led to the explosion. the material is stored it was in the hangar a number 12 which is one of the biggest and they store all flammable in that order material that is highly sensitive to explosions and otherwise and those who are stuck there by quote touring because they're not allowed to enter lebanon and they were basically trying to get them into lebanon using excuses off using them for fertilizers so that the ports so far saying and it seems that something terribly when drunk there and they were not stored properly there was a lot of flammables and and then there was a massive fire followed by intense 6 trillion which basically destroyed 2 to 30 kilometer radius of homes and houses around i was one of those who is missing or the glass and an entire entrance to a house because of the blast basically it's negligence you have got the customs department better sponsible for it and then you've got the ministry of

the american university of beirut hospital, as of last night, had treated 400 serious trauma wounds.he glass. we drove up and there is extensive damage along the motorway. there are a lot of warehouses, industrialareas motorway. there are a lot of warehouses, industrial areas around the port area, and all of those are damaged or destroyed. the hospital didn't have some of the antibiotics that i was supposed to be prescribed. we had to go to a 24—hour pharmacy that was luckily open along the road. and so that gives you a kind of scale of the incident that the emergency services are dealing with here. even hospital are dealing with here. even hospital a good drive out of beirut has run out of supplies because they had to treat so many patients. another anecdote... lizzie, i really appreciate your time this morning, lizzie porter and jackson allers, i'm glad in the circumstances you are ok and safe for now. thank you for that. lizzie porter and jackson allers, as you heard they witnessed the explosion and felt the immediate aftermath. and what we know this morning, of course, is that th

beirut. public policy fellow and professor of journalism at the american university in beirut in washington d.c. fill us back with a junk professor at george washington university also in beirut ilias hanna a retired general in the lebanon's army warm welcome to your rami the 1st reaction among many lebanese across the political spectrum was basically it took us all these years an army of investigators lawyers jurists to say that silly biassed is to blame but not being able to connect the dots so not being able to bring him into court there's many dimensions of the decision that was unsatisfying to most people interesting thing about it is that. people had some things a lot. and to hezbollah people have something they like but most people i think gave it a shrug of the shoulders they don't think it was an instrumental or ending impunity . they are wondering whether an international investigation of port explosion is going to be we're made a similar straight so many different dimensions to this but in the totality i found it rather a low key. process. for us the tribunals is not monday to in a w

kilometers away we can now speak to dr i mean coetzee's a professor of clinical emergency medicine at the american university hospital beirut's main hospital and president of the lebanese society of emergency medicine can you tell us about your experience treating patients it must have been a very difficult and grueling night for health workers and i suppose hospitals are still overwhelmed today. thank you for giving us time to do ringback this kind of experience yesterday basically the you know i hate to use the stick do the statement that we had in beirut had the opportunity to unfortunate the fortunate you to train for the mass casualty instance so most of our associates get sent to the hospitals got to some extent experience and the plans for deployment getting such incentives over certainly has been a an excellent one for that one that we've discovered and published internationally 'd so however yesterday's must schedule the incident was peculiar when the blast happened we went immediately into full activation flow experiment disaster plan and automatically all our faculty and their sis and staff activated then mobilized

of trade health and telecommunications. earlier i spoke to dr amien can't see from the american university hospital in beirut who's also president of the lebanese society even the chintzy medicine he said the hospital treated hundreds of patients immediately after the blast and witnessed some heartbreaking scenes. we expect not only a 2nd wave no more typically get ill people we expect in doing the us when we have to extricate patients we expect 'd another way that our lives later but they typically are dead or have more severe injuries due to crush injuries but the numbers of those patients of alive or subject will be less so technically speaking after last injury and that again unfortunately i must say that we have acquired experience and knowing what to expect however we were surprised in this particular event by the sheer numbers i mean we had the worst blast we've had in beirut even when you're in the civil war and if you did that really association the prime minister we were hit we were being hit by want 252531 that i wouldn't expect 100 to 5 on the casualty story that's shared on there we were having a hard time dealing w

professor of journalism at the american university in beirut tells "gps" he has a plan to make sure alle it is supposed to go. he proposes a competent of ngos, ak dims, professional, civics to oversee the government to fair distribution of the promised aid. he says it would not only rebuild beirut but build back confidence in lebanon's leaders. sometimes these kind of crises can have the effect of a wake-up call and jolt a country to a change and reform. lebanon desperately needs such a shock to the system. the country was once a model for the middle east. today it is becoming more like syria or iraq. mismanaged basket cases. in a different era, he says the united states would have played president macron's role, in organizing an international conference, gathering funds and pressing for reform and rebuilding. in a post-american middle east, this tragedy runs the risk of simply festering and becoming one more piece of ditritis in an already embattled region. lebanon is one of the oldest settlements. people in desperate need of medical attention and supplies. please consider visiting cnn

rattling on the mediterranean island of cyprus about 160 kilometers away well earlier i spoke to a doctor i mean cut c. from the american university hospital in beirut who's also president of the lebanese society of emergency medicine he told me about about how he the hospital treated hundreds of patients immediately after the blast but said they'll be even more pressure on the health system in the days ahead. we expect not only a 2nd wave no more typically get ill people we expect in doing the us when we have to execute patients we expect 'd another way that our lives later but they typically are dead or more severe injuries due to crush injuries but the numbers of those patients of alive or salvageable will be less so technically speaking out to the rest injury and that again unfortunately i must say that we have acquired experience and knowing what to expect however we were surprised in this particular event by the sheer number i mean we had the worst blast you've had in beirut even when you're in the similar war in if you did that really association the prime minister we were hit we were being hit 515253 on that i wouldn't expect what on the 25

of so much deadly explosive for so long in a warehouse so close to the city centre? jeremy bowen, bbc news. 0ur correspondent, carine torbey has been at the american university medical centre in beiruting at the moment in front of the emergency gate. people are still coming in either to check on their relatives or to check whether their relatives are inside the hospital because they're still a large number of people who are unaccounted for. of course, the hospital, this hospital, like every other hospital in beirut, has been completely overwhelmed. they are working to their utmost capacity and are still unable to deal with the larger number of injured coming to the hospital by the second. of course, every single space in the hospital has been turned into an emergency unit. as you can see, people are treated in corridors, people are treated even inside offices, not only in the medical rooms of the hospital, because it is impossible to accommodate everyone in the rooms. even the hospitals are categorising people according to the severity of their cases and giving priority to those who are at a very critical condition because this is the only way to deal with this high, very high press