BAGHDAD, 29 November 2005 — A military vehicle carrying three congressmen overturned on the way to the Baghdad airport, injuring two of them, the US Embassy said Sunday.
Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Pa., was airlifted to a military hospital in Germany for an MRI on his neck, and Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., was sent to a Baghdad hospital for evaluation, said Rep. Jim Marshall, D-Ga., who was also in the vehicle but was not hurt when it overturned Saturday.
Murphy is “bumped and bruised, but in good spirits,” his chief of staff, Susan Mosychuck, said Sunday. He will return home from Germany as soon as he is cleared by doctors, she said.
Skelton spokeswoman Lara Battles said she believed Skelton was also doing well. She declined to comment further.
The politicians were riding in a convoy that was driving in the middle of the road, a common practice used by the military in Iraq to deter oncoming motorists. Shortly after dark, an oncoming tanker truck refused to yield, the embassy said in a statement.
“Then all of a sudden brakes get slammed on. Then we hit something and go off the side of the road and tip over,” Marshall told The Macon (Ga.) Telegraph by phone from Baghdad.
Marshall said that as the vehicle toppled over, he held onto Skelton, who has limited use of his arms due to childhood polio. The embassy said the driver’s quick reaction “probably averted disaster.”
The delegation had traveled to Afghanistan for Thanksgiving with the troops and then on to Baghdad to meet with troops there.
