Cyprus. We’d like you to sit with him.’
They offered me a sleeping bag as I had no kit. It was going to be a night on the floor for me.
‘How are you feeling?’ I asked Stuart.
‘A bit groggy,’ he mumbled back. ‘How’s my leg?’
‘It’ll be fine mate,’ I lied. ‘Don’t worry, it’s still there; you’ll be playing football for Wales soon.’
I thought this was the best thing to say even though I knew otherwise . There was no point stressing him any further. He had asked me if anyone had spoken to his parents and I said Oggy was through to London and they now knew. Moments later, Stuart was out for the count again. I went to check back in with Jeff, who told me London were all over it but Stuart’s family wanted to talk to me on the Sat Phone. They didn’t know me from Adam but I assured them he would be on his way tomorrow and was in good hands, and returned to sit with Stuart, rolled up in my sleeping bag …
He was in and out of sleep, and by 05.00 the Yanks were in anyway to move him. It was time for me to leave and for him to make that long journey home. My job was done and someone else would take it from here, and that was how I saw it. Nothing like this choked me – I was more concerned about getting back to Arbil. I had seen too much of war and life to get emotional. Stuart faced a long road ahead, but tomorrow was another day for me. That’s just how I was, and how I learned to deal with tragic incidents like this. I had done my part and had no personal responsibility to his section – that wasn’t my style. It would be months before I would see him again.
As I said goodbye, I had one last question to ask. ‘What were you wearing on your feet?’
‘Sandals,’ he replied.
I’d feared he would say that. ‘How many times have I told you? Why weren’t you wearing boots?’ But now wasn’t the time to criticise. I had said it before and I would say it again hundreds and hundreds of times over the years.
This was Stuart’s first big gig and even though the locals believed that these mines dated from the Iran–Iraq War of the 1970s, and the terrain was now lush and green, our guys had all learned about off-road driving into places like this on the BBC Hostile Environment Course.
I hated to say it. This was an unfortunate accident; it might not have made a difference, but we both looked at each other knowingly. Stuart shouldn’t have been in sandals.
‘How’s things?’ they asked when they saw me enter the restaurant.
I had hitched a long, precarious lift back to Arbil. I needed my single bed in this pokey little hotel, my feet dangling over the end of it. I was that exhausted I didn’t care.
‘I am fucking knackered,’ I told the boys, before filling them in on Stuart’s progress. And then we left it. That’s what we did. I told them what I knew and we moved on. A small amount of sympathy, followed by a relevant dose of information, topped off with the next briefing. It’s just how it was.
By the next morning, 4 April, Stuart was hardly mentioned. We had a war to cover and Simpson was itching to cover it. Even knocking on the door of sixty, he still had it, and couldn’t wait to get cracking. The word was that fighting had increased and, again, John was worried we weren’t near the story. Rageh Omaar was looking like a star in Baghdad. That had been John in 1991, and he wanted it to be John in 2003. He was desperate to find a way out of here but even with that mindset, there was no way he would be embedded. That, to John, said control and censorship. He wanted to roam, hunt down and sniff out the story that nobody else had. That’s why he was John Simpson.
The next day we found ourselves twenty kilometres east of Al Qasr. One of our tip-offs had come good and we found ourselves spending the night with American Special Forces. I had wandered over discreetly to introduce myself as one of their own and see if they would mind if we took some general shots.
They offered me a sleeping bag as I had no kit. It was going to be a night on the floor for me.
‘How are you feeling?’ I asked Stuart.
‘A bit groggy,’ he mumbled back. ‘How’s my leg?’
‘It’ll be fine mate,’ I lied. ‘Don’t worry, it’s still there; you’ll be playing football for Wales soon.’
I thought this was the best thing to say even though I knew otherwise . There was no point stressing him any further. He had asked me if anyone had spoken to his parents and I said Oggy was through to London and they now knew. Moments later, Stuart was out for the count again. I went to check back in with Jeff, who told me London were all over it but Stuart’s family wanted to talk to me on the Sat Phone. They didn’t know me from Adam but I assured them he would be on his way tomorrow and was in good hands, and returned to sit with Stuart, rolled up in my sleeping bag …
He was in and out of sleep, and by 05.00 the Yanks were in anyway to move him. It was time for me to leave and for him to make that long journey home. My job was done and someone else would take it from here, and that was how I saw it. Nothing like this choked me – I was more concerned about getting back to Arbil. I had seen too much of war and life to get emotional. Stuart faced a long road ahead, but tomorrow was another day for me. That’s just how I was, and how I learned to deal with tragic incidents like this. I had done my part and had no personal responsibility to his section – that wasn’t my style. It would be months before I would see him again.
As I said goodbye, I had one last question to ask. ‘What were you wearing on your feet?’
‘Sandals,’ he replied.
I’d feared he would say that. ‘How many times have I told you? Why weren’t you wearing boots?’ But now wasn’t the time to criticise. I had said it before and I would say it again hundreds and hundreds of times over the years.
This was Stuart’s first big gig and even though the locals believed that these mines dated from the Iran–Iraq War of the 1970s, and the terrain was now lush and green, our guys had all learned about off-road driving into places like this on the BBC Hostile Environment Course.
I hated to say it. This was an unfortunate accident; it might not have made a difference, but we both looked at each other knowingly. Stuart shouldn’t have been in sandals.
‘How’s things?’ they asked when they saw me enter the restaurant.
I had hitched a long, precarious lift back to Arbil. I needed my single bed in this pokey little hotel, my feet dangling over the end of it. I was that exhausted I didn’t care.
‘I am fucking knackered,’ I told the boys, before filling them in on Stuart’s progress. And then we left it. That’s what we did. I told them what I knew and we moved on. A small amount of sympathy, followed by a relevant dose of information, topped off with the next briefing. It’s just how it was.
By the next morning, 4 April, Stuart was hardly mentioned. We had a war to cover and Simpson was itching to cover it. Even knocking on the door of sixty, he still had it, and couldn’t wait to get cracking. The word was that fighting had increased and, again, John was worried we weren’t near the story. Rageh Omaar was looking like a star in Baghdad. That had been John in 1991, and he wanted it to be John in 2003. He was desperate to find a way out of here but even with that mindset, there was no way he would be embedded. That, to John, said control and censorship. He wanted to roam, hunt down and sniff out the story that nobody else had. That’s why he was John Simpson.
The next day we found ourselves twenty kilometres east of Al Qasr. One of our tip-offs had come good and we found ourselves spending the night with American Special Forces. I had wandered over discreetly to introduce myself as one of their own and see if they would mind if we took some general shots.
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