Rats sniff out landmines
2004-12-04 21:22
Nairobi - Giant African rats, reputed for their fine sense of smell, are twitching their noses across fields and roads in Mozambique to trace deadly landmine aroma, as part of a global effort to clear the devices that still kill and main people after past wars.
"Currently, a fully trained platoon of African Hamster rats, brooded and raised in Tanzania, is engaged in the process of demining," Frank Weetjens, who manages Mozambique's mine detection programme non-governmental organisation, APOPO, said.
"Rats have a very strong sense of smell, which assists them to trace the scent of explosives," he said.
Unlike mine-sniffing dogs, which easily get bored or by mistake get blown up due to their weight, or metal detectors that cannot differentiate between metal and mines, rats enjoy twitching their noses on the ground for any smell of explosives.
Rats, are rewarded only with bananas and peanuts, undertake monotonous, repetitive tasks for longer periods than dogs that want more affection, but easily get bored.
Easy to trap
"Another significant advantage of rats is that they are easily deployed in large numbers due to their small size, light weight, and the fact that one trainer can work with many animals, whereas a dog-handler will usually work with only one or at the most two dogs," Weetjens added.
Mozambique's devastating civil war ended more than decade ago, but field officers have in recent years uncovered thousands of anti-personnel mines that have killed and injured an unknown number of people.
"The rats are very efficient because they are too light to activate anti-personnel mines and work single-mindedly, and on detecting the smell of explosives, they use their forepaws to vigorously scratch on the ground," Weetjens added.
Demining experts in Nairobi, where hundreds of delegates gathered this week for the first review of the 1997 Ottawa Convention, explained that rats are easy to trap and do not succumb to parasitic ailments common in African terrains.
"They can move across minefields better than men armed with metal detectors can," a Kenyan army official, who took part in demining operations along the Ethiopian-Eritrean border, said.
Despite the efficacy of the rats' Vapour Detection Technology, normal detection, where men armed donned in chest-to-groin Kevlar jackets, and armed with metal detectors remain the most preferred form of de-mining.
"It is a stereotype, but rats have proved to work better and pose little danger," a conference delegate said.
In Tanzania's Sokoine University of Agriculture, another group of 60 rats is being trained to join the 24 others that are currently active in Mozambique.
The Mozambique project and the Tanzanian programme are both funded by the Belgian government, the EU and Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD).