Beirut blast: Death count in Lebanon's capital climbs to 171

The death toll from Beirut's massive August 4 explosion has climbed to 171, a health ministry spokesman said on Tuesday.

The new figure, up from 160, came exactly one week since the mega-blast ravaged swathes of the Lebanese capital, wounding more than 6,000 and temporarily displacing 300,000 people from their homes.

The Beirut blast was so powerful that it was felt as far away as northern Israel and Cyprus (240 km away), and measured as a 4.5 local magnitude earthquake on the Richter scale by the Seismological Observatory in Jordan. 

Observers estimate that the blast had an explosive yield of between 200 and 500 hundred tonnes of TNT.

The city which has been reeling in economic hardships and the recent surge in coronavirus cases has now been laid to waste as blasts occurred at port warehouses storing highly explosive material.

(With inputs from AFP)