Russia’s State Research Center of Virology, in the city of Koltsovo in Siberia, has one of the largest collections of dangerous viruses anywhere in the world. During the Cold War, the lab developed biological weapons and defenses against them, and it reportedly stored dangerous strains of smallpox, anthrax, and Ebola among other viruses. So lots of people were concerned when an explosion ripped through the facility on Monday. According to Russian independent media , the laboratory was undergoing repairs when a gas bottle exploded, sparking a 30-square-meter fire that left one worker severely burned. Glass throughout the building was reportedly destroyed in the blast, and the fire reportedly spread through the building’s ventilation system . The lab is one of only two in the world known to still have samples of smallpox, which was eradicated from the wild in 1977. The other is in the United States . Experts say that under certain circumstances, an explosion could lead to the releas...
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