In the Spring of 1991, over 700 Kuwaiti oil wells were seriously damaged, with hundreds blazing, having being vandalized by the retreating forces of Saddam Hussein's defeated army of occupation.

My company won the job to coordinate and support the international teams of well fire fighters who descended on Kuwait within days or weeks of the eviction of the Iraqis.

The project to put out the well fires was called "Al-Awda," or "The Return" to signify the fact that Kuwaitis forced to flee the country when Iraq invaded in 1990 were now able to return to their homeland.

This was the situation into which I plunged in Summer 1991, and the photographs in this section chronicle some of what I saw.