Qayyarah Oil Fires

You can see the plumes of smoke from 30 kilometres away. This is the oil wealth of the Iraqi people going up in flames and the Islamic State's final act of vandalism. As a parting shot Islamic State fighters in July 2016 blew up 19 oil wells in the Qayyarah Oil Fields, the centre of Norther Iraq's oil industry, as the Iraq army expelled them from these rolling hills and villages. Eight months later several fires are still burning and there is a handful of firefighters and Northern Oil Company workers risking their lives breathing in toxic gas whilst surrounded by fields littered with mines and IED's laid by IS fighters, to extinguish the blazes. The immediate impact on the local people has seen 6 deaths and over 1000 hospitalised. Livestock has also fallen ill and their fleece turned black from oily residue falling from the sky. The environmental damage won't be fully understood for many years to come as long term they contaminate ground water and make the soil acidic. These images show this ravaged part of Northern Iraq, a testament to the ferocity of the fighting and the aftermath of which the Iraqi people have to endure.