At times, smoke covered all of Kuwait, and substantial parts of the surrounding countries. On the ground it was permanent midnight, lit only by the fires of hell.
It was a thick, choking smoke, rich with floating particles up to snowflake size. Sort of like standing next to a fire in a styrofoam warehouse. In the beginning, and in the worst parts of the burning fields, you had to wear a respirator all the time.
This improved substantially as the fires were snuffed out one by one. But even one burning well puts out an awful lot of highly toxic junk, as the pictures below attest.
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No, this is not Old Faithful. |
A satellite shot of four wells burning, along with oil flowing into the Arabian Gulf. |
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Where does the smoke end and the ground begin? |
Part of the midnight cap of smoke (at this point beginning to break up into individual streamers, as the number of burning wells got less and less). |
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Be honest now. Is this too much? How about THIS shot? |
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