One of the worst environmental disasters Tehran experienced recently was when its oil refineries and depots were hit by US and Israeli jets. Thick black smoke billowed into the sky, making day seem more like night. Toxic rain mixed with oil fell from the air, while a central boulevard was lined by a wall of flame. The explosion released large quantity of toxic hydrocarbon and sulfur and nitrogen oxides.

While residents were confined inside their homes, they could barely breathe. Highly acidic rainfall could further cause chemical burns to the skin and has the potential to damage the lungs severely. Despite rain dispersing much of the pollutants, the smell of the smoke was quite intense. The intensifying war in the middle East has sent energy prices soaring and led to global economic uncertainty. It is a repeat of what the region had experienced in the 1990s. Iraq’s then president Saddam Hussain had blown up 700 Kuwaiti oil wells during the first Gulf war. It took more than ten months to extinguish the fire, that too after using sea water. This was the third biggest environmental disaster after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and the Bhopal gas tragedy.

The fire in Kuwaiti oil wells that burned for ten months and threw pollutants across the region had also caused black snow in the distant Himalayas. It impacted the Indian monsoon in that period. Turkey, Bulgaria and Pakistan, too, experienced black rains. Environmental damage in Kuwait was severe and experts estimated that it would take at least hundred years to recover. Ninety per cent of Kuwaiti soil was contaminated. Use of sea water to extinguish the fire added salinity to the soil. The firefighters engaged in putting out the fire suffered from severe health issues.

Medical experts, who examined the lungs of firefighters, said that each of them had smoked for three years at the rate of three packs of cigarettes a day. It was a huge environmental and health cost to the nation. The recent hits by the US and Israel on one side and........

© The Statesman