Our man in Afghanistan: John Scott reports on a car boot sale like no other

In the final of his week-long reports, John Scott reports on the most bizarre car boot sale in the world:

It is a car boot sale like no other – with everything from a launderette to a 650-bed camp, complete with support infrastructure, up for grabs.

This is the military's end of season sale deep in the desert of Afghanistan's troubled Helmand Province.

And it is one of the most bizarre sights of the draw down prompted by the decision to bring British combat troops home this year.

Security-cleared Afghan businessmen and traders wander around looking for bargains on a giant patch of hard baked sand the size of almost 20 football pitches.

Prospective buyers put in sealed bids for items and the highest offer wins. There is also an opportunity to strike an individual deal with members of staff from Agility, the logistics company awarded the contract to organise these extraordinary army surplus sales.

Successful bids in the tender sale are notified by email and payment is in cash. Only dollars are accepted and plenty of them appeared to be changing hands when I visited on the Saturday, the last of two settlement days following Tuesday and Thursday viewings.

Still to be snapped up were a handful of Land Rovers together with exercise bikes, weights, step machines and a mobile laundry made up of two washing machines, two dryers and a generator set in a 20ft long shipping container with a side that swings up to create an awning. Nearby stood a golf buggy, quad bike and air conditioning units. The sporting gear came from recently closed army bases but the source of the golf buggy remains a mystery.

One Afghan man settling up had bought 50 shipping containers and a similar number of portable cabins, while another had secured 45 exercise bikes in the hope of launching a gym but nobody was saying how much had been paid for the items.

Mr Bowers also managed to sell two aircraft de-icing machines as the temperature hit 115 degrees Fahrenheit last summer. He said: "The tender sale is not to the liking of the Afghans but it gives us an idea of what the market is like. They prefer tough face-to-face negotiating. They bargain hard but when they agree a price that is what they pay."

Wood and basic construction materials are popular but nobody wants plastic flooring and the biggest seller of the lot are shipping containers.

The uses they are put to are wide and various with the refrigerated version the most sought after. Some people live in them, I had a shower in one and others are used as offices.

"They will sell all day especially when they are fitted with refrigeration units," added Mr Bowers. "Three months ago we had over 1,000 of them and now we have just a hundred left.

"We are trying all sorts of innovative sales techniques to get rid of them and have sold 600 in the past month. A buyer can be found for almost anything out here although we have struggled to move many of the size 15 boots."

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Jonathan Davis, the project manager, revealed: "The British Army has never done this before in this format. The agreement is for the disposal of non-contentious items by a sale to a third party. They go for a fraction of the market value but that is dwarfed into insignificance by the savings on not having to ship the stuff to the UK. We sell everything from nuts and bolts to dumper and fork lift trucks. It is all either reusable or repairable."

Lt Col Rob Cosgrove, the man in charge of the military redeployment from Afghanistan, said: "We are selling things of intrinsic value that we do not need or would not be cost effective to return to the UK. These are now being sold on the open market in a very slick operation." Civilian contractors were told about the first sale and then the invitation was extended to interpreters before the increasingly popular event changed from monthly to weekly and was thrown open to a wider market. They are currently spreading the net even wider by advertising some of the items being sold in Dubai.

This is not so surprising since RAF planes regularly fly from Camp Bastion to an air base in the United Arab Emirates just a few miles from Dubai. Mr Davis explained: "We are just getting in to that and have started small with stuff like ink cartridges but it could grow."

All visitors from outside the base have to go through a security check and have ID documents scrutinised before being accompanied throughout their stay at the Bastion Disposal Project. The best single day attendance so far is 65 with business booming at the moment and promises of a lot more items coming on the market as the draw down of British troops gathers pace.

Mr Davis, a former political liaison officer in Iraq, would only confirm that 'substantial' sums of money had been generated – although it is rumoured to involve hundreds of thousands of pounds. He also declined to discuss what percentage of the take went to Agility.

But he revealed: "I wake up never knowing what is going to come through the door that morning. It is the most interesting job I have done in a long time. It never fails to amaze me how honest the Afghan buyers are. We intend to carry on until the last safe moment."

Meanwhile, three of the four Forward Operating bases outside Camp Bastion still being used by British troops – at the height of the conflict there were 137 – are set to close in the near future. Two of these, at Lashkar Gah Durai and near Gereshk, will shut for good when West Midland and Staffordshire soldiers serving with the 3rd Battalion Mercian Regiment (3Mercian) leave in the next few weeks.

Their final action after their return from Afghanistan will be a series of summer marches through West Midland and Staffordshire streets where they have been granted the freedom of the town or city after their return from Afghanistan. An unforeseen logistical problem for the draw down of British troops emerged earlier this week with news that the RAF is to temporarily stop flying its military-registered Voyager planes after one plummeted several thousand feet during a flight to Afghanistan.

Some of the 180 passengers and 10 crew on the Airbus A330 were left with minor injuries after the incident last Sunday, which saw the plane diverted to an airfield in Turkey.

The Voyager, which was provided to the RAF under a £10.5 billion private finance initiative with the AirTanker consortium, has a dual role as an air-to-air tanker and transport aircraft, replacing the long-serving VC10 and TriStar planes. The aircraft is believed to have dropped several thousand feet for unknown reasons, causing some passengers and crew to suffer bumps and bruises.

The crew levelled the plane out, and it was diverted to Turkey, where investigations have begun into what could have caused the sudden drop in altitude.

The MoD said: "We can confirm that a Voyager aircraft suffered an in-flight issue and as a precaution diverted to an airfield in Turkey. A few passengers received minor injuries during the incident.

"The safety of all our air crews and passengers is our paramount concern, therefore it has been decided to temporarily pause military-registered Voyager flying while a full investigation is completed."

The RAF has civil-registered Voyagers, which fly to the Falklands and other places, and military-registered ones which fly to Afghanistan. The latter have been grounded as a precaution until inquiries have been completed but the civil aircraft will continue to fly.

The incident is likely to result in problems some soldiers and military personnel since the Voyager is used to fly troops home on their two-week mid-tour R and R break and when they have completed their tour of duty. Alternative travel arrangements are being put in place. Giant C17 transport planes were used to move troops after disruption to flights from Camp Bastion caused by the first major snow fall in the area in 16 years earlier this month.