Pyrotechnics team reaches epicentre of munitions site blast

Members of a police pyrotechnical team this week reached the epicentre of a blast which destroyed a munitions depot in Vrbětice, near Zlín, last Thursday. Two people remain missing but it will be some time before a proper search can be conducted in the devastated area.

Photo: CTK

At the weekend, police experts used a drone to navigate the scene of a massive blast last week which levelled a munitions depot near Zlín, South Moravia. Since, experts have pushed forward, for the first time reaching the centre of the site. Two employees at the munitions depot have been missing since the blast last Thursday and are feared dead. But it will be some time yet, before a proper search can be launched. Members of the team are focussing on dangers still at hand: taking readouts of the temperature at parts of the destroyed depot were fires still burn, registering heat as high as 140 degrees Celsius.

Pyrotechnic experts also checked the quality of the air, to test whether dangerous substances were being emitted. They were not. All the same, members of the team soon retreated to safer ground: intense heat from fires still smouldering beneath the rubble and live munitions scattered about the site, threatened further explosions.

Zlín police spokeswoman Monika Kozumplíková:

“During the morning we heard two additional detonations at the site. These were explosions which were not conducted or controlled by pyrotechnics experts. That means the site is still extremely dangerous.”

Photo: CTK

On Tuesday afternoon, the operation intensified, with experts for the first time using a special armoured tank to help in the eventual clean-up, providing protection for crew. The aim was for the tank to work alongside another armoured vehicle used by fire fighters to put out flames. Hlučín emergency service and rescue system deputy chief David Kareš:

“It is the most heavily armoured vehicle we have and the safest for these conditions.”

Work at the site on Tuesday lasted into the evening; during the night more blasts were registered. Police are continuing to guard a perimeter of more than a kilometre from the destroyed depot. An official investigation into the accident will begin, at earliest, at the end of the week.