Posted on 08/08/2004 10:02:31 AM PDT by propertius
Explosions hit Iraqi capital, casualties reported Eds: LEADS thruout to ADD details.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) — Six explosions boomed across central Baghdad on Sunday, sending plumes of smoke into the air. Four explosions hit the city in a row. Several minutes later two more blasts shook downtown, and the crack of gunfire rang out.
One of the blasts hit a bank of the Tigris River bordering the Green Zone, the fortified enclave housing the Iraqi government's offices and the U.S. Embassy.
A second, apparently from a rocket or mortar, hit a truck as it traveled down a street in downtown Baghdad, badly damaging the vehicle and causing some casualties, police at the scene said on condition of anonymity.
Flames and smoke leapt from the destroyed truck as firefighters tried to put out the blaze.
The blast collapsed part of a wall of a nearby house, and there were blood stains on the street. Shrapnel also smashed the windows of a nearby car, the seat of which was covered blood.
Police cordoned off the area, and one man looking for a relative pleaded to be allowed to pass. "My Brother! My Brother," he yelled.
After the second set of explosions, an air raid siren sounded in the Green Zone.
Mortar bomb in central Baghdad leaves casualties ATTENTION - ADDS details ///
BAGHDAD, Aug 8 (AFP) - A mortar bomb slammed into a small pick-up truck late Sunday as it drove through an eastern residential district of the Iraqi capital, causing casualties, police said.
The front of the truck was smashed in the impact of the mortar, leaving its chassis completely burnt in the blast, an AFP correspondent said.
Angry and nervous police officers at the scene said only that there were casualties, but it was not immediately clear how many.
The shell fell not far from a police station and about 100 metres (yards) from the popular Baghdad Hotel in the Saadun neighbourhood, near Karada, where two car bombs exploded outside two churches on August 1.
AFP correspondents heard two explosions seconds apart at around 7:55 pm (1555 GMT), sending smoke spewing up into the sky.
UPDATE 1-Mortars hit Baghdad street, wound three people (Adds details)
BAGHDAD, Aug 8 (Reuters) - At least two mortar bombs hit a street near a hotel in Baghdad on Sunday, wounding at least three people and setting two cars on fire, witnesses said.
They said the casualties from the attack near the Baghdad Hotel, which is used by foreigners in the Iraqi capital, were rushed to hospital. At least one appeared to be seriously wounded.
Insurgents have almost daily fired mortars at hotels and government buildings in Baghdad after sundown
Allegra, you know we will be waiting to hear that you are ok.
AFP now reporting one 10-year-old child killed.
I wish the AP and the rest of this nation would just start reporting when something in Iraq and the rest of the land of the religion of peace did NOT blow up.
They missed!
Zarqawi must die.
Our troops who go outside the wire remain in high danger because of these foaming-at-the-mouth idiots. And the insurgents are killing innocent Iraqi citizens. For what???
I want to see the heads of these snakes cut off for good.
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