Vital water reaches Umm Qasr

Orange Today ^ | 17:46 Friday 28th March 2003 | Orange Today

[Smogger]

Thousands of gallons of water will be pumped into Umm Qasr every hour as part of the huge humanitarian effort in southern Iraq.

British troops have laid a vital pipeline from Kuwait into the port town and 1.23 million gallons of water will be pumped in daily until after the weekend.

Throughout April, about 616,000 gallons will be delivered through the system each day thanks to the efforts of Royal Engineers in 48 Field Squadron.

The system, which will be tested tomorrow, comes as HMS Sir Galahad finally delivered the long-awaited relief aid into the port today.

Major Hugh Ward, officer commanding 48, said: "In terms of aid, water is the absolute top priority, then food, then sanitation.

"Prior to the fighting, water was being taken into Umm Qasr by tankers from Basra and sold to the people for a profit.

"The war has obviously disrupted those activities and it is vital that we establish an effective water supply as quickly as possible."

Major Ward, a father of two from Chester, has 150 men working under him and they have spent the last week laying the 2.6km (1.6 mile) pipeline from their base in the demilitarised zone, between Kuwait and Iraq, into Umm Qasr.

From there the water will be piped into tankers and taken to distribution points around the town.

The aim is to give each of the 35,000 people of Umm Qasr around 20 litres of water each day. At its maximum, the system will deliver 22,000 gallons in to Umm Qasr each hour.

[Smogger]

Good work boys. Repaired their water supply to better then before the war started. This is called "winning the hearts and minds" which IMHO is a very important part of this war.

[ican'tbelieveit]

The Kuwaiti's amaze me more and more every day.

[ImphClinton]

What a wonderful goodwill gesture. Perhaps these two countries will become close friends after the war.

Gotta love the Brits and the USA. We care about people and go out of the way to help even our former enemies.

[gaspar]

The great linguist and adventurer Sir Richard F. Burton wrote: "In none of the Eastern lanugages with which I am acquainted is there a single term conveying the meaning of our 'gratitude'" (Pilgramage to al-Madinah and Meccah).

Please don't expect too much from Iraqis; you would be asking them to overcome 50 centuries of inertia and a heriditary gene that results from 250 generations that bowed to the whip.

[raisincane]

God bless our dear armed forces. Such good men and women taking orders from a good man, President Bush.

[Grampa Dave]

The Kuwatis understand what the Iraqi killer/thugs can do to people very well.

Tha is why after DSI so many male babies were named George!

[SuziQ]

"Prior to the fighting, water was being taken into Umm Qasr by tankers from Basra and sold to the people for a profit.

That's an interesting bit of info. By WHOM was this water being sold? I notice the paper doesn't share that info with us.

[hoosiermama]

so many male babies were named George!

Are they now going to name them "DUBYA"?

[Grampa Dave]

Dubya or Bubba Gaorge

[Grampa Dave]

Or Abu Dubya!

[hoosiermama]

Great! A morning laugh!

Amma Dubya

Uri Dubya

Wea Dubya

(Had a local family who named their children: Freedom, Liberty, Justice and FURALL)

[Grampa Dave]

We should have a thread on suggestions for the Freed Iraqis and Kurds "How to Name Your New Sons after the American President Who Freed You!"

[hoosiermama]

Good light-hearted idea! Feel free to use my suggestions.

[Grampa Dave]

I was hoping that you might start a thread. I'm up to my neck updating the French products and companies to boycott.

Then, there is the task of countering the negative yahoos on Free Republic who post left wing threads of how we are losing this war.

Speaking of good news you might want to go Diogensis's latest thread. Dio shows the pure evil of the Fedayeen Soddomites and the freed Iraqis.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/879224/posts