But on the ground there was little evidence of impending war, except at the widely dispersed desert sites where troops awaited attack orders.

At Carlsbad, the waste will be stored almost half a mile below a desert site that has only 113,000 people living within 50 miles.

Media attention and the president's sober announcement at the end of her press conference two weeks before had brought enormous crowds to the isolated desert site.

The desert site is envisioned to open in 2010 and to receive up to 77,000 tons of radioactive material.

His survey records identified hundreds of desert sites.

Troops herd bewildered families into trucks nearly every week and haul them to three barren desert sites.

The desert site here will be studied for another week or two, with the remains that are found flown to Baghdad for further testing.

Trucks and construction crews now swarm over the desert site as Columbia nears a milestone in its takeover.

The landing at this desert site 100 miles north of Los Angeles brought to a close the 44th space shuttle mission, the 10th for Atlantis.

The Saharan desert site is famous for its petroglyphs (rock engravings) of different subjects.