VBIEDs at the Gate

"We rolled back to Ramadi early Sunday afternoon, after a long rotation out to Falluja. I took my personal gear and my 240B machine gun into the barracks, and stopped in to say hello to my medic buddy. I was headed back out to the 5-ton dump truck that we use to transport gear for another load of rucksacks and bags when the air split with a loud craaack-BOOM, and the ground shook underfoot. Everyone flinched towards the ground, and someone dryly cracked "That didn't sound like outgoing". A large black smoke plume shot into the air somewhere over towards the gate, turning grey as it mixed with the dusty sky. Black smoke, for a VBIED. I don't know why the VBIEDs always shoot black smoke into the sky, but they invariably do."
Acute Politics