Page 16 - IAV Digital Magazine #623

iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine
Photos Of The Giant Rats Leading Land Mine Detection Efforts In Cambodia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxyaxGPgUGM
By Anton Delgado
SIEM REAP, Cambodia (AP) — Rats may send some squealing, but in Cambodia, teams of the not-so-little critters have become indispensable in helping specialists detect land mines that have killed and maimed thousands in the Southeast Asian coun-
try.
The African giant pouched rats, which can grow up to 45 centimeters (around 18 inches) and weigh up to 1.5 kilograms (more than 3 pounds), are on the front line, making their way nim- bly across fields to signal to their handlers when they
get a whiff of TNT, used in most land mines and explo- sive ordnance.
“While working with these rats, I have always found mines and they have never skipped a single one,” said Mott Sreymom, a rat han- dler at APOPO, a humani- tarian demining group that trains and deploys rodent detection teams across the world.
“I really trust these mine detection rats,” Mott told The Associated Press while on her lunch break after working on a land mine field in the province of Siem Reap.
After three decades of con- flict in the previous
century, remnants of
war littered approximately 4,500 square kilometers (about 1,737 square miles) of Cambodian land, according to a survey by the Cambodian Mine Action and Victim Assistance Authority (CMAA) in 2004. This affected all 25 Cambodian provinces and nearly half of the country’s 14,000 villages.
The rats have a keen sense of smell, making them a favorite at APOPO, which also employs land mine-detecting dog teams.
“Dogs and rats are better compared to other animals because they are train- able,” said Alberto Zacarias, a field supervisor of APOPO’s technical sur- vey dog teams, adding that they are also friendly and easily learn commands.
Since demining officially began in Cambodia in 1992, more than 1.1 million mines have been cleared, as well as approximately 2.9 million other explosive remnants of war, according to a 2022 government demining progress report.
And the African giant pouched rats are doing their part.
“We work with them almost daily, so we get closer,” Mott said. “They are very friendly and they don’t move around and get scared. They are like family.”
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