VENOM OVER FLOWING DESERT SAND: Saudi Arabia’s Empty Quarter? No,a USMC UH-1Y Venom helicopter on an exercise near Brawley, California. Marine Venoms do a lot of training over desert terrain. Here’s an April exercise near Yuma. Well, a lot of U.S. military training areas are in our deserts. As a wizened fellow (who knew his maps) once pontificated, “Bay, roughly a quarter of these United States is hard a** desert. For some reason the mainstream media doesn’t know that…wait, it’s flyover desert…never mind. Gimme a sec, dammit. I gotta kick Fort Irwin off my boots.” Fort Irwin? Here’s a USAF A-10 conducting an “austere” landing at Irwin. This photo shows you why Army and Marine tankers love A-10s. More Irwin: An Abrams with a counter-mine kit prepares to attack opposing forces and a dusty Bradley crew scans the desert. Last but not least, another Marine sand photo, this time beach sand, not desert. An LCAC with the USS Bataan Amphibious Ready Group comes ashore during a landing exercise.