Schools closed as dust blankets Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia

Gulf News

Schools closed in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain following heavy sand storm.

Kuwait has suspended classes and shut down schools after it was blanketed in heavy dust.

The country's university, colleges and institutes were also closed for the day as a consequence of the bad weather, the education ministry said.

In Saudi Arabia, the authorities said that schools in Riyadh and several provinces would be closed on Sunday following warning from the General Directorate of Civil Defence of heavy dust storm. In Dammam, Saudi Arabia, the coastguards have warned fishermen against venturing in the sea, urging them to wait until the conditions improved.

In Bahrain, traffic authorities said that 54 accidents occurred between 6 am and noon after visibility was drastically reduced. Health officials said that 250 people had to be treated at the country's main hospital. 

Schools Closed today in Kuwait due to heavy dust storm

Today early morning when I called my daughter's school van driver to inform that she is not going to school due to sand-storm, he replied that school is closed today due to sand storm.
Hope the sky clears up tomorrow as she is suffering from fever and cold from Thursday night and I couldn't take her to the hospital due to bad weather.

Another ruined Weekend

It will be more then a month, that every weekend we are having sandstorm. In fact, early mornings are fine and by afternoon sandstorm starts and slowly it becomes horrible.All three of us are not keeping well, wont be wrong to say always sick because of the weather. It seems to me Jeet is becoming frustrated staying here and thinking seriously of moving out.

Sandstorm,Q8(2)

With too much of sandstorm every weekend, its becoming difficult to stay in Kuwait. Infact it had made me and my husband to think of shifting to some other place. With Mehr its becoming more difficult. She just recovered from cold and fever, and yesterday we had to go out for the weekly marketing and suddenly had to face a terrible sandstorm. We could never had gone out but since the last 3weeks we couldn't do any marketing because of sandstorm, we had absolutely nothing at home. But now all three of us are sick with cold, fever and running nose. Hope the weather changes to better.

Sandstorm,Q8

When you stay in a desert country you cannot escape from sandstorm and we have experienced it many times. Continuously for the last two days,today is the third day we have sandstorm in Kuwait. But nothing was more terrible and horrifying then the one that Kuwait faced on 25th March. We were out and when we saw the approaching clouds, we thought it would rain after few hours.It was a terrible mistake, actually it was clouds of sandstorm.We went to Mishref and hurriedly came out in 10-15mins and to our utter surprise it was horrible sandstorm. We had never seen and experienced such sandstorm before.We did wait for 15 mins and decided to drive home.We somehow reached our car but there was no visibility.Still Jeet drove very slowly and we took some time to reach our home safely.But another shock was awaiting us,though all windows were close,it was sand everywhere.

Here are pictures of the sandstorm and what it did to my house and plants......

The worst part was cleaning the house. The maid did not come and Jeet had to go to office.I thought I had to go Ahmadi hospital as I feared suffering from dust allergy as I had to clean it all myself .

The sandstorm in Kuwait for the last three days has made Kuwait International Airport shut down temporarily yesterday. Many schools have declared holiday today as it is predicted that todays sandstorm will be strong one.Yesterday my daughter came home earlier then her regular school time because of bad weather.Its really making life difficult.

Sandstorm in Q8

Today the weather was clear and pleasant early in the morning. But around 9.30am a sudden sandstorm engulfed Kuwait.
All of a sudden the clear sky was filled with sand. The sand filled air turned orange accompanied by heavy wind. An awful scene. Sometimes the sandstorms are so horrible; you can hardly see the opposite person. The entire city comes to a standstill. This is common and happens every year, not once but many times in a year. A severe sandstorm in Kuwait leads to closed ports, diverted incoming flights to neighboring countries and leads to university and school classes being cancelled. Even it leads to horrible traffic jam.
Luckily only four times I was out at the time of sandstorm. But my husband really has horrible experiences. Today, along with few friends planned to go out but had to cancel the trip. I took the pictures from the balcony of my friend Surekha, who stays in the same building.