Wind Storm in Baghdad...

We had a wind storm or "shamal" blow through last Friday. Large, gray clouds of sand and dust covered our sunny day within minutes. It became so dark it tripped some of the light switches on the TIF. Here's the view at noon...

Shamals tend to blow from the northwest of Iraq, picking up sand from the deserts of Jordan and Syria. The shamal can continue southward into the Persian Gulf states, primarily Saudi Arabia and Kuwait but can reach as far as Oman. The winds and sand can slow regional air travel, strip paint from cars, and overwhelm hospitals with thousand of patients suffering from respiratory distress.

Here is a couple of cool pictures taken recently of a large sand storm overtaking Al Faw Palace in Baghdad. Looks like something from the Wizard of Oz...

Then it rained off and on Friday night, all day Saturday and Sunday morning. We're dry now but for a couple of days all that dust turned into mud... a sea of chocolate pudding everywhere...

A group of folks from the CSH ran the "Baghdad Chief Petty Officer 117th B-Day" 5k at Victory this weekend. A 3.1 mile loop around Al Faw Palace and here is the aftermath...

We were so messy that the Ugandan guards at the Oasis DFAC in Victory would not let us in... and that was after washing everyone down with bottled water twice! Coming back to Cropper, I entered my flat to find this message on the hall door--which means clean your boots elsewhere, I'm guessing...

Such tidy soldiers so far, far from home... moms, wives, and girlfriends would be very proud!