Shafaq News/ The Civil Defense Directorate said on Tuesday that a team was heading to control the fire incident at Balad air base north of Baghdad.

The directorate said in a brief statement received by Shafaq News that an explosion occurred in a pile of equipment belonging to a faction of the Popular Crowd near Balad air base, indicating that "our teams are trying to control the incident."

Media sources and witnesses reported on Tuesday that thick black smoke emitted near Balad airbase in Salahuddin province.

According to what sources and witnesses told Shafaq News, the reports are still conflicting on whether the incident was caused by a fire or bombing in the base itself or a military headquarters of the Popular Crowd near that base.

Balad Air Base (formerly Al-Bakr Air Base) is the largest air base in Iraq, 64 km north of the capital Baghdad that was established in the mid-1980s by Yugoslav companies.

In the summer of 2008, US forces used the base as a crematorium and a landfill for chemical and medical waste, destroying 140 tons of waste a day.

US forces handed the base over to the Iraqi side on November 8, 2011.

Balad became the headquarters of the US-imported F-16 squadron, which received its first batch of aircraft on July 13, 2015.