Send in the rats
American scientists are devising ways to train rats so that they can be parachuted into landmine-infested areas, carrying a backpack containing GPS and a radio tracker, sniff out the explosives and map out the mines for destruction.
Right now you probably have visions of kamikaze rats being splattered across the battlefield, but its not quite that inhumane. Landmines seep a chemical into the ground and the researchers are training the rats to sniff out this chemical, not to sacrifice themselves upon unexploded ordinance. The electronics in the backpack relays the exact position back to a central computer system which allows the decommissioning teams to map out safe routes through the minefield and remove the "explosive remnants of war" using more traditional means.
Figures on land-mine fatalities are hard to verify but one of the most thorough studies (Landmine Monitor) concluded that over the ten year period from 1999 and 2008, worldwide there had been 17,800 fatalities and a further 51,700 injuries to people, mostly civilians, often children, from these devices. With figures like that, maybe we should welcome these initiatives to speed up mine removal, no matter how silly they sound.
I'd be more impressed though if the USA would formally sign the 1997 Ottawa Convention on the ban on the use of land mines, destroy its stockpile of millions of mines, and put pressure on the other 38 countries, including Russia, China, India and Pakistan, which also have so far declined to commit to the treaty.
30th June 2012