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CAMP MAINE, KUWAIT
Soldiers stung by sandstorms
By Brian MacQuarrie, Globe Staff, 3/16/2003
Punching through enemy lines is one thing. Finding your way in a fierce sandstorm is quite another. Staff Sergeant Bryan Day, of Smiths, Ala., found himself battered and blinded by gale-driven sands Wednesday night, on what should have been a 250-yard hike to artillery headquarters. Instead, Day and his superior officer, Captain Josh Snyder of Carlisle, Pa., were forced to grab each other's flak jackets, bend themselves at a 45-degree angle, and stagger back to their tent, relying mostly on their memory. The walk back took 45 minutes. They weren't alone. Another soldier lost his way on a similar walk, walked into a sand berm thrown up by the Army, and waved his flashlight for three hours until the storm stopped its beating. The soldier was only 100 yards from his tent. All through the night, tents snapped violently as the Third Brigade hunkered in sleeping bags. Dust filled the air inside their austere quarters, thick coatings of sand rose like snowfall on clothing and equipment, and the pounding of wind-whipped canvas was complemented by hacking coughs from sand-scratched lungs. The brigade's artillery commander, Lieutenant Colonel Doug Harding of Lincoln, Mass., said maneuvers would be difficult but not impossible in such conditions. ''Air operations would be hurt,'' Harding said. ''We could shoot through anything.'' Still, sandstorms in March -- even one as violent as last week's -- are preferable to their summer cousins. Day said the effect in July, when the temperature can reach 140 degrees and higher, is like blowing a hair dryer full-blast at one's face while simultaneously being pummeled with sand. The sergeant recalled one storm last summer that lasted for two full days. ''We did a lot of reading, listened to the radio if we could get the signal, and tried to keep the equipment from getting ruined,'' Day said. Since its deployment here last March, Harding said, the brigade has suffered through four or five such storms -- called ''shamals.'' With a wry smile, he looked around his desert home and said, ''Welcome to our hell.'' This story ran on page A21 of the Boston Globe on 3/16/2003.
oldiers from the Army's Third Brigade, Third Infantry Division who are scattered about this parched swatch of desert are expected to be the lead, lethal element in any invasion of Iraq, only a few miles to the north.
© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.
