A huge fireball lit up the sky as Syria was rocked overnight by a series of powerful explosions at an army site south of Aleppo, sending rockets and other projectiles across surrounding villages.
The initial blast was reported at an ammunition depot in the area in the early hours of Monday, followed by successive detonations that continued to shake the countryside.
Video on social media showed a towering column of smoke and bright streaks crossing the night sky. Some clips also appeared to show secondary detonations and projectiles being propelled from the site.
State media later reported that a preliminary toll put the number of injured at four. Civil defence teams were initially unable to reach the site because continuing explosions made the area too dangerous.
Roads leading towards the site, including the Aleppo-Damascus motorway, were closed. Residents were warned to stay away because of the risk from shrapnel and unexploded ordnance.
Authorities have not announced a cause for the explosion.
In an interview aired by the private Syria TV channel, security and strategic affairs expert Brig Gen Mohammad Al Baqaei said the scale of the explosions pointed to an external cause.
He said ammunition depots require particular expertise and security, but said he was “almost certain that these explosions were the result of external action”.
External attack suspected
Brig Gen Al Baqaei outlined several possibilities, including deliberate sabotage, explosives planted at the facility or remnants of explosives left behind from earlier fighting.
However, he argued that the presence of “dozens of explosions” supported what he described as the hypothesis of an external attack.
Brig Gen Al Baqaei said he was “almost certain that this was a deliberate act of sabotage”, while suggesting that unidentified aircraft could also have targeted the depot.
He further said they were “most likely Israeli aircraft”, which he suggested could have targeted the facility to prevent the Syrian army from accessing ammunition seized from the former army.
Brig Gen Al Baqaei provided no evidence publicly establishing an Israeli strike, and Syrian authorities have not attributed the explosion to Israel, sabotage or any other external actor.
The blast comes amid a series of explosions at Syrian military weapons sites.
On September 1, at least five people were killed when munitions exploded while being transferred from a vehicle to a warehouse in Binnish, in the north-western province of Idlib.
Eight days later, an explosion tore through a temporary weapons and war-remnants storage facility near Sarmada in Idlib. The Defence Ministry said 14 personnel were killed and more than 10 were injured.
And on Saturday, an explosion struck a weapons cache at a Syrian army position in Ayyash, west of Deir Ezzor. The Defence Ministry reported 11 military personnel killed.
Syria analyst Charles Lister said the string of explosions raised questions.
Writing on X, he said “three Syria Defence Ministry arms depots have exploded in 11 days” – in Idlib, Deir Ezzor and now Aleppo.
“It’s still summer weather in Syria, and storage practices could be better,” he cautioned, adding: “Three in 11 days seems too much to be coincidence. Big questions.”
