'Hero rats' used to sniff out landmines

Nice work, little fellows!

Giant rats are being trained to sniff out buried landmines in war zones.

Landmines are placed in the ground during a war to seriously injure or kill the enemy.

But they often remain undiscovered for many years and ordinary people can end up stepping on them by accident.

The rats are being used because they are light enough to walk over the devices without blowing them up and can search wider areas more quickly than humans.

When the first of Apopo’s furry and four-legged HeroRats were released into a landmine-ridden field of Mozambique, there was understandable skepticism among the various government officials in attendance.

“In Mozambique we eat rats,” joked Alberto Augusto, the director of Mozambique’s national demining institute, “so it was very strange to see them working and demining. We were thinking to grill them.”

But as the gigantic rodents (bigger than New York City sewer rats) stuffed into tiny harnesses began to sweep back and forth on ropes between their human handlers, stopping every so often to scratch and point out a landmine, it didn’t take long for the crowd to be convinced.

“These are not normal rats,” Augusto declared. “They are very special rats.”

The HeroRats are officially known as Mine Detection Rats (MDRs), specially trained by Apopo, a Belgian NGO that researches, develops and implements detection rat technology for humanitarian purposes like demining.

Landmines continue to be one of the world’s most dangerous weapons, especially in post-conflict countries. Scattered across 78 countries, these weapons of war can remain buried beneath the surface for decades, and their deadly nature does not diminish over time. According to The International Committee of the Red Cross, more than 800 people are killed and 1,200 maimed by landmines every single month - most of them children, women, and elderly.

The sleepy African coastal nation of Mozambique remains one of the most heavily mined countries in Africa. Tens of thousands of landmines were laid during the struggle for independence between 1964-1975 and the civil war that followed for nearly two decades. With no maps of mined territories, Augusto says working to clear the entire country is a “major challenge.”

Yet since Apopo’s rats launched into action in 2006, they’ve successfully cleared more than 6 million square meters of Mozambique’s countryside, uncovering 2,406 landmines, 992 bombs, and 13,025 small arms and ammunitions.

“They are doing a great job,” Augusto says, and with their help he believes Mozambique can be mine free in less than 20 years.

From CBBC and BBC - Future- Technology

 

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