Blast at Iran military base leaves 3 injured

An explosion has ripped through a military base in Iran’s southern province of Hormozagan, damaging properties and leaving three people injured.

The incident took place at around 9 a.m. local time on Wednesday (0530 GMT) as an explosive charge went off in Naiband district of Bandar Abbas — Hormozagan Province’s capital.

“Garbage collected at the base was set on fire, which caused the explosive charge to go off,” Police and Security Chief of Hormozgan province Mohammad Hassan Poravar was quoted as saying by Mehr news agency.

“Three people were wounded in the explosion. They have been taken to hospital for medical treatment and there has been no further damage,” he said, adding that “nothing else happened and the rumors going around in the city are all baseless and untrue,” he added.

This is while Fars News Agency, citing eyewitnesses, reported that several nearby houses sustained different levels of damage and fire broke out following the incident.

According to the eyewitnesses, shrapnel as big as a cellular phone and with a thickness of two centimeters flew by and landed in the yards of houses about 1 km away from the blast site.