Transliteration:( Wa laqad ataw 'alal qaryatil lateee umtirat mataras saw'; afalam yakoonoo yarawnahaa; bal kaanoo laa yarjoona nushooraa )
73. These are settlements of the people of Hazrat Lut (On whom be peace) on whom stones had fallen and had been overturned. People of Arabia who would go to Syria for trade purposes would see the remains of these devastated and overturned settlements.
 From this, we learn that for proof of historical incidents, reputable reports about them are sufficient, because the Arabs had known about the conditions and whereabouts of these ruins from personal observations and not from the verses of the QURAN.
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The tafsir of Surah Furqan verse 40 by Ibn Kathir is unavailable here.
Please refer to Surah Furqan ayat 35 which provides the complete commentary from verse 35 through 40.
(25:40) They have surely passed by the town which was rained upon by an evil rain.[53] Have they not seen it? Nay; but they do not believe in being raised up after death.[54]
53. The habitation referred to was that of the people of Prophet Lot (peace be upon him), which was destroyed by a rain of stones. The people of Hijaz while traveling to Palestine and Syria, passed by its ruins and heard the horrible tales of its destruction.
54. As the disbelievers did not believe in the Hereafter, they looked at these ancient ruins as mere spectators and did not take any warning from them. Incidentally, this is the difference between the observation of a disbeliever and of a believer in the Hereafter. The former looks at such things as a mere spectator or at the most as an archaeologist whereas the latter learns moral lessons from the same and obtains an insight into the realities beyond this worldly life.
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