June 30, 2008
Another day another crash
Just spent most of today covering Sudan's fourth fatal air disaster in two months.
It was also Sudan's second cargo plain crash in fours days. And it was the second time passengers have died in a fireball at the end of our road at Khartoum airport in three weeks.
If Sudan's air safety record wasn't so dismal, now would be the time to start forming conspiracy theories. But no one seems to be suggesting there was anything sinister behind today's accident.
An Ilyushin Il-76 cargo plane carrying at last four people, all thought to be Russian, crashed seconds after taking off from Khartoum's city centre airport. One man I spoke to was driving up the runway in an airport bus as the plane took off at 7am local time. He said the left wing of the plane never lifted. Another eye-witness said it was an example of a wing stalling – something to do with a sudden change in air flow around the wing. The plane barely made it 50ft into the air before it suddenly veered to the left and came down in a "fireball".
At the scene, you didn't have to be an air crash investigator to work out what happened next. There was a big black mark on the grass one side of a dual carriageway. There was then a clear trail of smashed concrete and aircraft parts diagonally across both lanes. The plane had come in, skidded across the road, smashed into an electricity line on the other side, disintegrating as it went. It then hit an area of open land – essentially an empty city block - filled with deep trenches and hedged in by office blocks and flats. The only part of the wreckage that was recognisably a plane was about a third of its fuselage that had made it about 100 metres into the wasteland.
It was the first time I had seen a plane crash up close so soon after it happened. And the force created by such a short, low flight was devastating.
There were at least two scary 'what-ifs':
- The plane had come down in one of only a handful of empty blocks in that part of the city. A few seconds sooner or later and it could have piled into the UN headquarters, a nearby military compound, the Afra shopping centre, Sudan's top-end Rotana hotel and, more seriously, any one of scores of other blocks, heavily developed with flats and offices.
- On practically any other day of the year, that dual carriageway would have been packed with cars and trucks and taxis. Today was a public holiday so the road was empty
It was also a reminder of the perils of having a genuinely city-centre airport. AFP had the best description of an airport "located in a built-up area, sandwiched between four main roads, wealthy residential areas and close to key installations such as the UN headquarters".
I can remember feeling very impressed that when I first arrived in Khartoum, it only took five minutes to drive to our flat from the airport. Now, although we have moved about another five minutes away, that doesn’t seem like such a good selling point for our beautiful new neighbourhood.
Plans are underway to build a new international airport on the safe outskirts of Omdurman. Those are the same safe outskirts that came under attack from a band of Darfur rebels just over a month ago.
Posted by aheavens at 6:56 PM | Comments (0)
June 23, 2008
Able profiteers Liberation Movement
It looks like Darfur's SLM-Unity rebels have started using Google Translate to turn their Arabic statements into English.
A significant military statement from slm-uAble profiteers Liberation Movement / Army Command Unit in Darfur noon today, 08/06/2008, in sharp two twenty Greenwich Sudan and local forces across the 126 Brigade of the movement in the northern sector of the ambush of a military brigade infantry military mechanic continued for the Sudanese government and army Sudanese region between "gosa GMT" and the City "al towacha" North Darfur close to a local "um Kaddada" North Darfur.
It was defeat enemy forces represented in the Sudanese government forces completely burned and nineteen armored four-governmental payment, loaded with equipment and supplies, and some Alzacherh internationally prohibited weapons cluster bombs with high fission, as forces captured Liberation Movement / Army Command Unit on the number five Military vehicles with four-payment of a Sudanese army, and the number of battle left 157 dead amid the Sudanese army and a large number of injuries, where lie the rest of the Army forces from escaping.
As the movement has lost 7 soldiers of the Army movement.
And as we declare that we reiterate on behalf of the SLM / A leadership Unity Movement's commitment to all the ceasefire agreements signed and the protection of civilians, but in return movement will not stand idly by in case their positions transcripts of any provocation by the army of Sudan, and market movement cut leg Each would-be detracting from the sovereignty of liberated territories and under the control and sovereignty of the Army Command Unit.
Any linguists out there fancy reverse engineering that one?
Posted by aheavens at 10:44 AM | Comments (2)
June 16, 2008
Acronym of the week: OAG
As in – So there are the four or five blood-thirsty militias that we know about lurking outside our town, kidnapping our children, attacking our women and stealing our cattle.
And then there are also these other guys ...
Posted by aheavens at 9:10 AM | Comments (0)
May 28, 2008
You know you lived in Khartoum when...
Facebook has got a very khawaja-focused group called You know you lived in Khartoum when…
- you think that 35 to 39° C is a good outside temperature.
- you were involved / witnessed rickshaw crash.
- you had 2 occasions in a year to wear a sweater.
- every Friday morning you take breakfast to Ozone and say hello to everybody out there.
- after that you go to the swimming pool at the Sudan German club, and complain about the huge number of people in the water.
- you saw ashtrays made with baby crocodile heads.
- you still not understand why you have to pay to leave the country (isn’t it like being an hostage ? ).
- you prefer Universal Café ice creams to Tutti Frutti’s ones, and Tutti Frutti’s ones to Ozone ice creams.
- you have never read so many books in your life.
For me, the ice cream choice is so the other way round.
But anyway, back to the looming war.
Posted by aheavens at 6:27 AM | Comments (3)
May 26, 2008
The biro is mightier than the AK-47 M-16
In the old days, the pen was mightier than the sword.
Now, according to the logo of Darfur's United Revolutionary Force Front (URFF), the biro is mightier than the AK-47 M-16 (thanks rcfiver - see comments).
Although, given the fact that the rifle is on top of the biro in the image, maybe it is the other way round. Which is less poetic but, in Darfur right now, more realistic.
Posted by aheavens at 8:29 AM | Comments (2)
It's hot
NPR's reporter took a break from the usual who-why-what-where-when of journalism to talk about the current weather in Khartoum:
Today's it's as dry as an old piece of toast...It's hot. It's so hot that even the insides of oranges are steamy on your tongue. It is so hot that you can even smell your own hair burning. It is so hot that somehow it feels OK to stand under an awning and ignore a photo display of young dead rebels in wells of their own blood. And that should never be OK.
I can confirm that it is indeed very hot.
Posted by aheavens at 6:51 AM | Comments (2)
May 21, 2008
Do not panic
Your capital has just gone through the first rebel attack that anyone can remember for decades.
Your population is jumpy after a week of door-to-door searches and mass arrests.
So what do you do?
Sudanese armed forces hold shooting exercises north of OmdurmanText of report in English by state-owned Sudanese news agency Suna website
Khartoum, 20 May: Early this morning the Armed Forces held shooting exercises north of Omdurman.
Major Al-Sawarmi Sa'ad, the director of the office of the Armed Forces official spokesperson, called on citizens not to respond to the rumours and asked them to remain calm.
Posted by aheavens at 7:36 PM | Comments (0)
May 19, 2008
From today's papers
British newspapers often try to increase circulation by serialising parts of a bestselling book – often the bonk-buster memoirs of a disgraced politician.
Here is the Sudanese version, from the front page of today's Advocate newspaper:
**********
Announcement
The Advocate Daily Newspaper shall be serializing:
The 'Oslo 2008 Donors' Report on Sudan' and 'Towards a Strategic Framework for the Multi-Donors Trust Fund for Southern Sudan' on pages 4 and 12 respectively.
**********
The thing is, these turgid, acronym-filled UN/donor/NGO reports do often count as mini-bestsellers here.
Go to Abyei or Juba and you will find people who can recite parts of the Report of the Abyei Boundaries Commission (ABC) or the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) verbatim.
And while we are in an unpleasant sneery mood, here is a front page apology from today's Citizen newspaper.
**********
Apology
The Citizen would like to apologize to our sincere readers for the mistake that appeared on our yesterday's lead story about Melez Zenawi, who was quoted as the President of Eritrea. The correct is that Melez Zenawi is the President of Ethiopia.
We are sure that our readers have observed that was unintended mistake.
**********
It is an easy mistake to make. Aren't Melez, the President of Ethiopia, and Izias, the Prime Minister of Eritrea, cousins, or something like that?
Posted by aheavens at 7:30 AM | Comments (5)
May 17, 2008
An afternoon out in Omdurman
Another sunny Saturday afternoon – and what better way to spend it than visiting the new Chadian invasion exhibition - AKA the 'Exhibition of the Brave' - in Omdurman.
Just in case you missed it (and I understand the story didn't get a lot of play on British TV), this time last week, Darfur rebels were mounting a full-on assault on Omdurman – one of three cities that make up greater Khartoum, just 30 minutes drive away from our home.
After almost a day of fighting, government forces pushed the insurgent Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) troops out of the city, leaving behind them at least 220 dead (rebels, civilians and army - according to the army), rows of bullet-scarred buildings and a huge pile of hardware.
Sudan quickly blamed its western neighbour Chad for funding and directing the attack. It then spent most of last week making mass arrests and collecting all the captured hardware together for an exhibition.
The show took place in the grounds of the Khalifa's Mosque. Outside there was a line of slick Photoshopped banners with pictures of victorious Sudanese government troops waving their weapons under slogans like 'Chad will pay' and 'We are not afraid'.
The gates were guarded by two huge tanks with little Sudanese flags tied to their barrels and soldiers armed with everything from rifles to rocket-propelled grenade launchers all around. I wasn't allowed to take photos of the tanks, but everything else was fine – this was a 'victory' exhibition after all and they had a lot to show off.
Inside, it was a bit like a village fete. Singers blared out popular patriotic sings in one corner, surrounded by dancing men and children waving sticks in time with the music. In the centre of the field, there was a pile of twisted and battered vehicles the army said had been captured from the invading JEM forces.
Along one side of the field was a line of military vehicles carrying mortars, grenade launchers, anti-aircraft guns, and chains of what were either small rockets or huge, huge bullets.
Soldiers posed for photos, answered questions from the crowd, swivelled in their captured gun turrets and let children climb up alongside them for more photos.
Every so often someone would come up to try their English, grin madly into the camera and shake their fists in victory.
Over on the stage another song blared out. Another crown of men and children rushed to dance on the stage. A small boy climbed up on to the shoulders of a dancing soldier, grabbed his assault rifle and waved it in the air.
There are a few more photos on Flickr.
UPDATE: Dangerous things these post-victory examine-the-military-hardware exhibitions. An hour after we left, a visitor was killed when one of the exhibits - some sort of grenade - exploded in his hand.
Posted by aheavens at 2:02 PM | Comments (0)
