Size of Nord Stream Blasts Equal to Large Amount of Explosive

By Staff, Agencies 

Denmark and Sweden have said leaks from the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea were caused by blasts equivalent to the power of “several hundred kilograms of explosive.”

The conclusions were made in a joint report by Denmark and Sweden which was delivered to the United Nations. The UN environment program said on Friday the ruptures are likely to have led to the biggest single release of climate-damaging methane ever recorded.

German authorities have also said they believe that highly explosive detonations were responsible for the sabotage attacks on the two pipelines. The EU, Nato and the governments of Poland, Sweden and Denmark have all said they believe the leaks were caused deliberately.

Data analysis has revealed huge clouds of methane gas are hovering over the leaks, from natural gas that has been pouring into the Baltic Sea from both pipelines since Monday, the ICOS, a greenhouse gas observation system operating across Europe, reported.

The pipes, built to transport gas from Russia to Germany, and only one of which was ever activated but both of which were full of gas, are said to be unusable due to the damage caused by the ruptures.

Intelligence sources quoted in the news magazine Spiegel believe the pipelines were hit in four places by explosions using 500kg of TNT, the equivalent to the explosive power of a heavy aircraft bomb. German investigators have undertaken seismic readings to calculate the power of the blasts.

On Friday, Vladimir Putin blamed the US and its allies for blowing up the pipelines. The Russian president said: “The sanctions were not enough for the Anglo-Saxons: they moved on to sabotage. It is hard to believe but it is a fact that they organized the blasts on the Nord Stream international gas pipelines.”