BRAY MAN ESCAPES BEIRUT EXPLOSION
BRAY MAN ANTHONY CLERY AND HIS NEW WIFE MARIA WERE HALF A KILOMETRE FROM BLAST,
BRAY man Anthony Clery is appealing to the people of his home town to help with aid efforts in Beirut, to help the city recover from a huge explosion which took place on the evening of Tuesday, August 4.
Anthony and his wife Maria had a miraculous escape from injury, with their apartment just 0.6 of a kilometre away from the blast site.
‘ I’m in shock still,’ said Anthony, speaking from Lebanon, where he and Maria had moved to her father’s home in the mountains.
‘ We’re shook from having been so close to the blast,’ he said. Anthony suffered lacerations and scratches, while his wife Maria was uninjured, despite their proximity to the explosion.
Their apartment was severely damaged in the blast, which emanated from a building at the port.
Having been parted for five months due to Covid-19, and they got married just days before the disaster in Beirut.
Anthony was working at his desk in a guest room/office in their apartment when he saw the first flames and smoke close to their building. He was on a work call, and just sending a photo to Maria in the next room, when the second blast hit.
‘ My wounds are healing now,’ he said. ‘ There was a bed behind me which I think helped me withstand the blast.’
Anthony said that he feels ‘ useless’ in the aftermath of the tragedy, as his feet are covered in cuts and he can’t go out to help. In the meantime, he is encouraging as many people as possible to donate to the Red Cross and local fundraising to help people suffering in Beirut.
He and Maria, he said, are among the luckiest because they had an undamaged home to which to retreat, and did not suffer any life- threatening injuries.
The people of the city of Beirut and of Lebanon are feeling a mixture of grief, anger and sadness, as the nation is plunged into mourning, according to Anthony.
‘ People are suffering in different ways, some more than others, but nobody has been untouched by what happened,’ he said.
Comparing the disaster to another in living memory, 9-11, he said that while in that instance, parts of the city outside of twin towers were relatively unscathed, every part of Beirut has been damaged in some way.
As he spoke last Friday, the number of confirmed deaths was 137, with many more expected to be confirmed over the passage of time. Around 5,000 people suffered injuries. Anthony said also that there will have been undocumented people working in the area who will have died, and may not be included in the numbers of missing or deceased.
The number of people now homeless in the city is estimated to be around 300,000, with so many buildings decimated that there is nowhere for them to go.
Anthony spoke also of the economic and health crises which the city had already been battling due to Covid-19.
‘ It is a credit to the Lebanese people that they are so resourceful and responsive to each other,’ said Anthony.
Maria is from a small town on the outskirts of the city. She and Anthony met in Mexico around two years ago, as he embarked on his travels around the world, an adventure for which he had been saving up for almost a decade.
Before deciding to settle in Beirut, Anthony found a US- based job which would allow him to work remotely.
He proposed last February in Romania and they had planned to get married in Cyprus in May. With Covid-19, Lebanon closed its borders completely and the two were forced apart until July. They had rescheduled the wedding, hoping it could happen in Cyprus in August.
With things changing rapidly, they found out that it would not be possible to keep that date.
They then planned to marry in Lebanon at the end of July but were warned that there would be another lock- down.
With two days notice, they managed to organise a church and venue, and with some help regarding documents form Fr Michael Kelly of Holy Redeemer, they managed to tie the knot. Anthony’s sister was able to make it to the wedding and is now home in quarantine in Bray.
They had moved into a brand new apartment with views of the harbour. ‘ We went on a mini honeymoon, and the Tuesday, the day of the blast, was our first “normal” day.’
Anthony was working, and Maria came home at around 5 in the evening. They went to a nearby café for a coffee, went to the bank and the pharmacy, and returned at around 6, 10 minutes before the explosion.
‘ It would have been different if we had still been outdoors,’ he said.
‘ I heard a big noise and saw the port go up in smoke,’ said Anthony. There is a tall building which is still standing and he thought was the source of the smoke.
‘ The fertiliser was stored in a building behind that, unbeknownst to locals.
‘ I didn’t know it was an accident, or a new war, even though there has been peace with Israel for many years. I was in the middle of a call with work to my team in the States.’ He sent an image to Maria to see had she heard anything about what was going on.
‘ The second blast came in. I felt the blast quicker than I heard the sound. It was dark very suddenly and a huge grey wall came in.
‘ My office chair rolled back and glass shot towards me covering my face and arms.’
He had just bought a painting of Ireland which hung over the bed behind him.
Maria was in the kitchen with her friend. They had made it back to the corridor away from the kitchen, which was decimated in the blast.
‘ There was smoke everywhere and I could hear one pitch ringing in my ear and nothing else.’
The smoke then faded and Anthony could see that a wall was missing from the apartment. He could hear sirens and screaming, see rubble, and that he was covered in cuts. He called for Maria and they found each other. ‘ I hopped over the bed and found her crouched down.’
They thought there had been more than one explosion at different locations in the area and didn’t know of more would come.
They managed to get their passports, wallets and some other items before making their way outside.
‘ The pillow from our room was on the ground outside, six storeys below,’ said Anthony. People were holding dogs, screaming in different languages, and there was chaos. A man asked to borrow Anthony’s flip- flops to retrieve something from his apartment. They needed to go, and thankfully the footwear was soon returned.
They didn’t attempt to get their car from the underground car park and started to walk in the opposite direction to the explosion.
While walking uphill for 25 or 30 minutes, they saw cars flipped over, broken windows and rubble.
‘ The hospitals were like something from over- exaggerated war films with walking wounded everywhere,’ said Anthony. ‘ Every window was smashed.’
They managed to flag down and get a lift further along, getting out at a spot closer to Maria’s dad’s house. Still, windows were broken and buildings seriously damaged.
This was a distance from the site of the explosion which Anthony likened as between the city centre and Malahide, and the noise extended to distances similar to that of between Wicklow and Drogheda.
They took a taxi to Maria’s father’s home, and had managed to get messages by phone to friends and family during their journey.
Watching videos of the mushroom cloud
I’M SO GRATEFUL THAT WE WERE MIRACULOUSLY PHYSICALLY UNHARMED... THINGS CAN BE REPLACED, WE WOULD RATHER HAVE EACH OTHER
that decimated the city, Anthony felt as though he was in a dream.
‘ I thought this couldn’t be real,’ he said. ‘ It was like something from a move.’
While Anthony required some stitches and a tetanus shot, he did not have concussion or serious injury.
He did pass out in hospital coming up to midnight, he said due to shock, and lack of food.
‘ Ireland and Lebanon, in size, are very similar,’ said Anthony. ‘ If you imagine we’re on the sixth floor of, say, Google or Facebook at the Grand Canal, and the port is exploding, every window from Blackrock to Howth is shattering, people from Wicklow Town to Drogheda hearing the noise, people in Wales can see the explosion.
‘And then walking the next two and a half hours on the banks of the Liffey… walking to the Dublin Mountains and then just seeing smoke and rubble behind you.’
‘ I’m so grateful that Maria and I were miraculously physically unharmed, and that we had somewhere safe to stay,’ said Anthony.
‘ There are people who now haven’t got anything.
‘ Things can be replaced,’ said Anthony. ‘ We would much rather have each other than the apartment.’
He and his wife are currently trying to arrange a visa for Maria to be able to travel to Ireland for the couple to recover from the shock and restart their lives.
Meanwhile, Anthony hopes that the international community will come together to support Lebanon in its hour of need.
‘ People really have to act, he said.