Sandstorm engulfs Baghdad

Enveloping the capital in an eerie orange glow, a blinding sandstorm today reduced visibility in Baghdad to a few feet – slowing traffic to a crawl, canceling a key meeting on the Iraqi constitution and sending hundreds of people to the hospital with breathing problems.

Howling winds whipped up desert sands overnight, coating the streets of the city in a gritty opaque haze by early morning.

Though sandstorms are common in Iraq’s desert terrain, especially during the summer, the one that arrived overnight was the worst in two years, long-suffering residents said.

“Baghdad looks miserable today,” resident Ahmed Malik said. “Shops are closed as if there is no life in the city, as if a nuclear bomb attacked it. It’s completely abandoned.”

The storm’s fury forced Iraq’s political leaders to postpone key talks aimed at breaking an impasse over drafting the country’s new constitution by next Monday’s deadline. A second round of talks had been set for Monday evening but was postponed for at least a day.

The capital’s weather forecasting centre said the sandstorm is expected to last for 48 hours, though lessening in intensity. Storms were also reported across Iraq’s border in Kuwait and southeastern Jordan.

An estimated 300 people crowded into Yarmouk Hospital complaining of respiratory problems – many of them asthma sufferers, said Dr. Muhannad Jawad. Hallways quickly filled up with patients, many of them very young or very old.

For Baghdad’s long suffering residents, this summer has been particular brutal. Power shortages due to insurgent attacks have left most families with only a few hours of electricity a day during a broiling summer where temperatures routinely hover around 45C degrees (113 F)

The last time a sandstorm of this magnitude was reported was during the US invasion of Iraq in spring 2003, when the military march to Baghdad was delayed for several days.