Many rescuers were sent out to search for any survivors in Beirut on Wednesday (August 5, 2020) after a huge explosion at the port brought about massive devastation and destruction across the entirety of the port area. A total of 135 people were found dead, while thousands were injured. Officials said that the death toll is expected to rise.

The governor of Beirut, Marwan Abboud, described the disaster as “an apocalyptic situation”, which he estimated might have made 300,000 people temporarily homeless and would cost the country in excess of US$3 billion in damages.

Skymap Global immediately acted on this and started doing pre and post-disaster analysis over Beirut, to understand the gravity of the situation and the effects of this explosion.

DETAILS FOR THE ABOVE IMAGE

Top: coherence image 24/07 to 05/08 (before and 1 day after the blast)

Middle: coherence image 24/07 to 30/07 (2 images acquired before the blast = reference or no destruction)

Bottom:  RGB with Coherence VV ( 24/07 to 30/07 );  Coherence VH ( 24/07 to 30/07 ); Coherence VV ( 24/07 to 05/08 ) 

Sea is dark blue; the unchanged city is white; destroyed area (decorrelation) is dark blue (red ellipse)

The area in dark blue shows the extent of damages that have occurred due to the blast. Skymap Global makes use of SAR imagery to analyze the post-disaster scenes. SAR imagery is paramount in these situations as it has the ability to penetrate through cloud covers. This makes it easier for everyone to understand the extent of damage because of the catastrophe.

Using Geospatial technology, we are able to understand the size of the blast’s effect, which is 3 km² of total destruction. We hope that the information gathered using our remote-sensing expertise will aid in understanding this disaster, as well as assist in accelerating the recovery process.