Beirut bride caught up in photo shoot from hell

A bride from Beirut will remember her wedding video for all the wrong reasons after the city’s terrifying explosion sparked utter chaos in the middle of her photo shoot on Tuesday.

One moment Israa Seblani, 29, was smiling in her wedding dress in a ritzy downtown square. Wedding photographer, Mahmoud Nakib slowly pans around her face, then brings the camera down to show off the train of her gown.
 

But at that moment flowers can be seen being ripped from the ground and her dress billows out as the impact of the explosion sweeps through the square.

Mr Nakib then turns the camera around to show residents running for their lives.

“Allahu Akbar,” Mr Nakib can be heard saying in prayer. “God is the greatest.”

Smoke can be seen filling the square and glass can be heard raining down.

The footage shows trees and outdoor furniture scattered around, as nearby windows are broken and a dark dust fills the air.

RELATED: Deadly substance that caused Beirut blast and why it exploded
 

At one point the photographer turns the camera on himself.

“Look at me, I’m shaking,” he says in Arabic. “There was a really, really big explosion. All the storefronts have been smashed. Some people have been injured, but thank God we are fine. Everything is broken.”

Returning to the scene a day after the explosion, Ms Seblani told Reuters: “I have been preparing for my big day for two weeks and I was so happy like all other girls. ‘I am getting married.’ My parents are going to be happy seeing me in a white dress; I will be looking like a princess.

“What happened during the explosion here – there is no word to explain … I was shocked, I was wondering what happened, am I going to die? How am I going to die?”

The blast centred on the city’s port caused massive destruction and killed at least 113 people, heaping misery on a country already in crisis.

A frantic search for survivors of the blast was under way overnight, with footage of one man emerging from the rubble after 10 hours shared online.

Video posted on Twitter showed a woman playing a piano in the rubble of her apartment, while another showed a woman shielding young children as they watched the blast roll towards them, blowing out the windows of their apartment.

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