First snow in Camp Bradman
Trevor
Grant describes the surreal first snow of winter on New Years Eve in
the tent camp of the Australian Defence Force at Dhanni, high in the
mountains of Kashmir
It was cold, the wind was howling and driving
rain had been pounding all day with no sign of easing. The ground was
a quagmire.
By
8pm, after a hard, cold day, with the temperature hovering around zero,
most people had gone to bed to warm up. With no warning, the wind and
rain subsided and in almost eerie silence snowflakes the size of fifty
cent pieces began gently floating down from the night sky. We had our
first snow at Camp Bradman.
From
those still up and moving around the camp came shrill yells of "It's
snowing!".
People soon began to emerge from their tents to admire this peaceful
assault from Mother Nature.
Some
of us from sunny Australia had never seen snow. For folk accustomed
to sunnier climes, and operational experience in deserts and the tropics,
the snowflakes were an almost mesmerising sight. Others wasted no time
in letting the inner child come to the surface in snowball fights.
Continuing
well into the night, the snow showed its other character -- as a problem.
Snow began weighing heavily on the tents. The fun of snowball fights
and reverie about scenic beauty were quickly forgotten as people were
roused from warm sleeping bags in minus 6 degree temperatures to scrape
built-up snow from the roofs of sagging tents.
Dawn
revealed a spectacular sight of about 30 centimetres depth of snow surrounding
the camp. Members of the team emerged from the cocoons of their tents
in temperatures around minus 4 degrees, to join colleagues standing
with cups of tea and coffee to admire the snow-covered scenery.
The
fun and games were over. With the temperature hovering around zero for
most of the day, people had duties to perform. Tents had to be reinforced;
drainage systems cleared and patients seen.
We
adapted and got on with the humanitarian mission we came to do. Some
of us reflected on the fact that last time Australian Defence Force
units deployed on operations through winter in sub-zero temperatures
and snow was during the Korean War, back in the 1950s.
Flight Lieutenant Trevor Grant is a Royal Australian
Air Force public affairs officer with the 1st Joint Public Affairs Unit.
He has been attached since December 2005 to the Australian Joint Task
Force for Operation Pakistan Assist. Trevor Grant shot many of the photographs
of humanitarian relief operations in Pakistan and Kashmir published on
this website.
