ALBAWABA- Eleven Syrian soldiers were killed and at least nine others injured when an explosion struck an ammunition storage facility inside a Syrian army position near Ayyash in the western countryside of Deir ez-Zor province on Friday, Syrian authorities said.
The blast occurred at a weapons cache within a military site belonging to the Ministry of Defense. The explosion triggered a series of secondary detonations, sending ammunition and projectiles across the area and initially preventing ambulances, firefighters and civil defense teams from reaching the site.
Security forces cordoned off the area and closed nearby roads as emergency and rescue teams worked to contain the fires, evacuate the wounded and search the site for casualties and possible missing personnel. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that 10 people were injured, some seriously, while the provincial authorities reported nine wounded.
On Saturday, the Defense Ministry held a funeral procession for the 11 soldiers at the National Hospital in Deir ez-Zor city. Their bodies, wrapped in Syrian flags, were carried in a ceremony attended by military officers, relatives and fellow service members. State media reported that the soldiers were killed while handling or transporting heavy ammunition at the site.
The Defense Ministry said an investigation had been opened to determine the cause and circumstances of the explosion. No definitive explanation has been announced.
BREAKING: An explosion of unknown origin at a military site in Syria’s eastern Deir Az Zor region has killed at least 11 people, says the Syrian defence ministry.🔴 More on https://t.co/OwhgaIGyGh pic.twitter.com/mu7YgiYefq
The incident is the second major explosion involving a Syrian military-linked weapons facility this month. On September 9, an explosion at a temporary weapons and war-remnants storage facility near Sarmada in Idlib province killed 14 Ministry of Defense personnel. It injured more than 10 others, including civilians, according to Syrian authorities. The cause of the blast remains under investigation.
Dr. Mansour Al-Maswari is Postdoctoral Fellow at Columbia University-Global Center, Amman. A Yemeni academician with a Ph.D. in English "Comparative Literature" and two MA degrees, one in political science and the other in English, Dr. Al-Maswari possesses more than 17 years of extensive experience in university-level teaching, research, research reviewing, bilingual translation, and copy-writing...
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