Details of bridge collapse emerge; Extent of casualties unknown

Pictured: U.S. troops and private security forces employed by Armor Groups struggle to remove concrete rubble atop wounded soldiers today.

MAHMOUDIYA, Iraq - With a thunderous rumble and cloud of dust and smoke, an apparent suicide vehicle bomb brought down a section of highway bridge south of Baghdad on Sunday, wounding several U.S. soldiers guarding the crossing and blocking traffic on Iraq's main north-south artery...

Armor Group security guards, all ex-military, and others in the convoy rushed to the ruins. They found a scene of confusion...

Soon the outpost sergeant in charge was organizing a search for his missing men, Smith said. The Armor Group team climbed up with first-aid kits, stretchers and other aid.

With the Army's quick reaction force, they struggled to lift concrete shards off the men, pinned along the slope of what was once a roadway. At one point, a Bradley armored vehicle with a tow chain pulled a slab off a pinned victim to free him.

Then a shout went up, "Morphine! Morphine!" and one of the black T-shirt-clad Britons administered painkiller to the freed man.

"Another poor fellow looked crushed beneath a concrete slab," said Armor Groups Donald Campbell, 40, of Inverness, Scotland.

Read the rest at Yahoo News

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Car bomber causes bridge collapse near Mahmudiyah; U.S. soldiers reported trapped in rubble