Car Bomb

We were at the Ministry of Interior this morning when it happened. In fact, if we’d left just five minutes earlier we would’ve been there when the car bomb exploded.

We were just sitting there, waiting before getting ready to leave. Most of the gunners were sitting down inside their turrets. A few of the guys were outside, standing, chatting around. Then there it was, BOOM! It shook everything from where we were located. I immediately knew that it must have been close and big. The first thing I noticed was that all the birds were flying away from the sound of the blast. I had an idea where the explosion came from but wasn’t too sure. Usually, after an explosion I’m looking for smoke. It’s the first sign of where the blast occurred. The birds also helped me identify the location of the blast.The smoke started rising into the air. The gunners started orienting everyone on the location of the blast. We were all just getting ready to leave too. IPs and IAs were immediately rushing out to the scene like firemen headed to a fire. They were jumping onto their trucks and gearing up as fast as they could. Some were running to the scene from where they were. I started to feel the adrenaline rush. So much of me wanted to get out there and help. I was hoping that we would leave and be the reinforcements on the scene. I knew something was still going on because I could hear the sound of sporadic gunfire continuously after the blast and following afterwards.We started moving towards the gate and I started doing some last minute checks on my gun and ammo. I wanted to make sure everything was ready just in case anything happened. I think all the gunners were psyched up and ready to go. We were ready. Then we got the call to standby. We weren’t going to leave the gate. A big part of me wanted to get out there to help. I don’t know what it was. I was anxious to just get out there then to just sit around and wait until things died down.