Communications with the base are almost completely severed.

TCD MS 10516 folio 20 verso

TCD MS 10516 folio 20 verso

[5th September 1916] if the change will infuse greater activity into our military life. Communications with the base are almost completely severed. The Hamar lake is so shallow that boats of but two foot draught are unable to cross. The Post launch is the only craft, other than the Arab bellum, that can maintain communication across this lake. Everything we recieveĀ  from the base must come in bellum convoys; a slow, uneconomical, unsafe, unreliable mode of transport. But the railway is being hurried up at the greatest speed over the desert. We learn that it is now about sixty miles from Khamsieh, that it advances nearly two miles a day and that we may expect it here early in November. Motor lorries have already come through. What a blessing the railway will be! How much more safe it will feel to know that a relia-