Blast injury

Also: explosion injury

The injuries an explosion causes, from the pressure wave itself to flying glass, falling buildings, fire and water. Most victims are hurt by more than one.

Questions this entry answers

  • What injuries does an explosion cause?
  • Why were there so many eye injuries in the Halifax Explosion?
  • How far away can an explosion injure people?

Definition

Blast injury is the range of harm an explosion does to the body. Modern medicine sorts it into four groups: injury from the pressure wave itself; from objects thrown by the blast; from the body being thrown or crushed; and everything else, including burns and smoke.

Historical context

The modern classification grew out of twentieth-century wars, but the injuries are older. Any large explosion near people, from a magazine detonation to a munitions ship, produced the same pattern. Civilians are often hurt worse than soldiers because they are not expecting it and are standing near glass.

How it worked

  1. Primary. The pressure wave damages air-filled organs: ears, lungs, gut.
  2. Secondary. Fragments and debris, especially glass, become projectiles. This is usually the largest group of injuries in a city.
  3. Tertiary. People are thrown against walls or the ground, or crushed when buildings collapse.
  4. Quaternary. Burns, smoke, and everything else, including, at Halifax, a surge of water from the harbour.

What it meant for the patient, the soldier, the civilian

In Halifax on 6 December 1917, many people had gone to their windows to watch a ship on fire in the harbour. Historians argue that this is why so many lost their sight: the glass came in at face height. Surgeons removed glass, pottery, brick, mortar and nails from eye sockets. Hospitals filled past capacity within hours, and the survivors faced a snowstorm the next day in houses without windows.

Examples from history

  • Halifax, 1917. Roughly 2,000 dead. 592 people with eye injuries; 223 fractures repaired and 25 amputations in local hospitals.

Sources

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Scholarly secondary source

  1. McAlister, C. N., Murray, T. J., Lakosha, H., Maxner, C. E. "The Halifax disaster (1917): eye injuries and their care." British Journal of Ophthalmology 2007;91:832–5. View source

    Not yet checked against the source

  2. McAlister, C. N., Marble, A. E., Murray, T. J. Canadian Journal of Surgery 2017;60(6):372–4. View source

    Not yet checked against the source

Historical interpretation

  1. Parks Canada, Halifax Explosion. View source

    Not yet checked against the source

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