A warm welcome in Afghanistan

March 4, 2011

Well, after a 27-hour door-to-door transit I have arrived safe and well in southern Afghanistan.

The last day has been a bit of a blur to say the very least. Arriving at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire – the gateway to most military operations – always seems like the cut off point between normality and the surreal.
Arriving in the dead of night ahead of a flight only adds to that weirdness.

Twinned with the emotional aspect of saying goodbye to loved ones at the terminal, it is a wake up call to what lies ahead. I travelled to where I am now in Camp Bastion with a large group of men and women from 3 Commando Brigade, based at Stonehouse Barracks.

Despite the hour, the mood among the group was high. These operations are what they train for so, while they may never admit it to family members, they are always looking forward to these tours.
 I was as anxious as I always am before heading out into the unknown.

And, given the fact that my particular tour is three months – three times the length of my last deployment to Afghanistan – my feelings were only heightened.

Travelling with the military is fairly straight forward. You do what you’re told and follow the lead. Oh, and you have to expect and accept delays.

My two flights into Camp Bastion were only slightly delayed, by about three hours in total. I was lucky. 

You hear horror stories about servicemen and contractors being delayed by anything up to three days. Now that is emotional. So too is donning full body armour and helmet for the final descent into ‘theatre’.

Being a civilian I’m not used to such a practice. So when the lights on the C17 plane dim to red and everyone falls silent as we fall from the sky to land, I can’t help but feel somehow under threat.
That sense of danger is only exacerbated when you can’t see out of a window to see how close we are to landing.

So I arrived into theatre late last night. And despite the late hour, the temperature was just a tad warmer than the UK. If it’s 10 degrees at 10pm how hot does it get on a spring day in Afghan?


This morning I found out when I awoke in what can only be described as my own personal sauna room. Close to 90 degrees Fahrenheit. And it’s spring. Eek.

The climate is going to be a major battle for everyone serving out here in the coming months. 50 degrees Celsius is apparently the norm in the summer here. And this is 3 Commando Brigade’s first summer tour of Afghanistan.

In the winter you can always put on an extra layer of clothing to keep warm. In the summer there is only so much you can take off – and then you still need the protection of your body armour.


Another – clearly apparent – factor is the amount of dust generated by the heat. It coats everything. Literally everything.

My throat already feels like the inside of a Hoover bag. And there’s no getting away from it. God knows how our camera equipment will deal with it. Only time will tell.

So with the emphasis today firmly on acclimatising and bedding in, I’m off to explore this strange new world they call ‘Camp Bastion’.


Twitter: @tristan_nichols