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1631-HQ-1462938 other. It was like fog, and then everyone became blind.” Some vomited. Faces turned black; people experienced painful swelling under the arms, and women under the breasts. Later, a yellow watery discharge oozed from the eyes and nose. Many of those who survived suffered severe vision disturbances, or total blindness, for up to a month. In Sheikh Wagan, survivors watched as a woman staggered blindly, clutching her dead child, and not realizing the baby was dead. Some villagers ran into the mountains and died there. Others, who had been close to the impact points of the bombs, died where they stood. The following morning, ground troops and pro-regime Kurdish militia entered Balisan, looted the villagers’ deserted homes and razed them to the ground. Sometime later, army engineers dynamited and bulldozed Sheikh Wasan. The surviving inhabitants had already fled during the night of the attack. Some made their way to the and a few to Shaglawa. southeast to the town city of Suleimaniyeh, But most headed of Raiya where there was a hospital. They were helped on their way by people from neighboring villages, including Barukawa, Kaniberd, and Tutma, which had also suffered from the effects of the wind-born gas. The people of Beiro sent tractor-drawn carts to Sheikh Wasan, and 10 of these vehicles, each carrying 50 or 60 people, left for Raniya. At the complex of Seruchawa, just outside the town, the tractors stopped to bury the bodies of 50 people who were already dead. The refugees who reached Raniya spent one night there. Local doctors washed their wounds and gave them eye-drops, but that did nothing to ease the effect of the gas on their vision. The next morning, agents from Amn [Directorate of General Security, or DGS] and possibly from military intelligence arrived at the hospital. They ordered everyone out of bed and into a number of waiting vehicles, 13