Bomb weight equivalent to four Eiffel Towers
The amount of US bombs moved to the Gulf for the onslaught on Iraq is equivalent to the weight of four Eiffel Towers, military sources said today.
Responding to suggestions that the Allies might run out of missiles, a senior Central Command official said: “The weight of bombs we have brought into the area is the same as four Eiffel Towers – it’s a hell of a lot of bombs.
“We have positioned assets offshore and will continue to bring those to where they are needed.”
The enormous logistics operation has also seen US forces laying five million square feet of concrete, the equivalent of 88 football pitches.
Their forces are drinking 1.5 million litres of water a day, enough to fill about 25 average size swimming pools.
They are using 15 million gallons of fuel each day, the same as is burned in the State of Florida.
A total of 65 million gallons of fuel is held in reserve across the theatre.
It is moved around in 700 collapsible fabric tanks – there are 50,000 gallon and 210,00 gallon varieties.
A senior military official said: “We have moved a population the same as Richmond, Virginia – that’s 200,000 people.
“The amount of equipment we have moved means we could have moved every household in Santa Barbara, California.”
The support operation delivered 10 million ready meals for troops in March, which is expected to rise to 17 million in April.
Current production is 480,000 meals a day and that is expected to go over half a million.
Responding to reports that some soldiers at the front had only received one meal a day the official said: “It’s flexible and from time to time a platoon sergeant delivering to his forces hasn’t got what he should.
“There are perturbations out there but the supply line has never stopped.
“Do we have enough food? Sure we do.”
One of the major logistic operations is getting replacement vehicles to the front but he said there was no demand yet.
“I’m not getting any indications that the Army are having difficulties with their vehicles,” the official said.
“We’ll see on the back end of this what happens when we have had extended operations for some time.”
The Iraq war has seen logistics officers introduce a new radio frequency tagging system to keep track of supplies.
There are more than one million radio transmitters attached to supplies allowing them to know precisely where and what each container is.
The official said: “It can be a problem, in Afghanistan for example the air force were having to move a lot of things around and were losing track of their stuff.
“We have got people moving where they have never been before, a sandstorm happens and you can’t see where you’re going.
“With this we are able to see where stuff is a lot better than we could in the Gulf War.”
