Barrage of Fire, Trail of Death in the Capital
For the soldiers — members of the Second Brigade's First Battalion, 64th Armored Regiment — it was a blistering gantlet of death and destruction that, they said, engulfed civilians as well as Iraqi fighters. It began just after dawn and ended when they arrived here at the airport, already occupied by the division's First Brigade.

A tank commander, sitting exposed in his open hatch, was killed when a grenade or mortar exploded in his face, soldiers and officers said. At least six American soldiers were wounded, some of them seriously.

One tank was destroyed, apparently by a rocket-propelled grenade, and had to be left behind in southern Baghdad after the crew was rescued. Other tanks and Bradleys were damaged, some pocked with the splash of rocket-propelled grenades and others charred by explosives.

A grenade hit Specialist Joseph A. Aiello's tank. "We were just riding along and all of a sudden you could hear a pow," he said. "The tank didn't really shake, but you could feel the vibration."

Sgt. Daniel R. Thompson, riding two tanks behind, saw the Iraqi who fired the grenade. He had fallen backward. "He had no legs," he said, but somehow managed to fire. Sergeant Thompson's tank commander killed the man in a burst of machine-gun fire.

Specialist Aiello, a gunner, said he simply never stopped firing, despite the grenade's blast. The Iraqi fighters, he said, fired from streets, from groves of trees, from highway overpasses. Many mingled with civilians caught up in the unexpected armored thrust. Some people ran. Others waved white clothes or held up their hands.

"It was hard to shoot, because you don't want to shoot the civilians," he said. "It was hard to pick out the threat."
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/06/international/worldspecial/06INFA.html?pagewanted=all&position=top