Page 28 - aruba-today-20170513

A28 SCIENCE
Saturday 13 May 2017

Body farm for researchers and detectives opens near Tampa

TAMARA LUSH the body at no cost. Any-
Associated Press one beyond that range
LAND O’LAKES, Fla. (AP) would have to pay for their
— A “body farm” where body to be transported to
researchers can study the facility.
how corpses decompose While the center is current-
will open next week in ly a field and grove of trees
the Tampa Bay area with near the Pasco County Jail,
the burial of four donated officials eventually hope to
bodies. build an indoor-outdoor
Officials broke ground Fri- training center that would
day on the Adam Ken- include classrooms, a
nedy Forensics Field, a five- morgue, a training facility
acre patch of land north and evidence storage.
of Tampa. It’s the seventh The Florida Legislature
such facility in the nation tucked $4.3 million for the
and the first in Florida’s sub- facility in this year’s state
tropical environment. The budget, but it’s unclear
oldest and most famous whether Gov. Rick Scott
body farm in the U.S. is at will approve the bud-
the University of Tennessee get. Kimmerle and Pasco
in Knoxville. County Sheriff Chris Nocco
Officials in Florida hope said they’ll also raise out-
their farm, to be used at side money for the project.
first by detectives and fo- For now, researchers are
rensic anthropologists at concentrating on the sci-
the nearby University of ence. The field is named
South Florida, will draw sci- Pasco County Sheriff Chris Nocco speaks with Abigail Kennedy and her daughter, Hannah in Land after one of the people
entists from other countries O’Lakes, Fla., Friday, May 12, 2017. Associated Press who will be buried next
and grow to be the largest week.
in the world. “This will enhance our train- sweltering humidity, more mine how different factors Adam Kennedy, a 46-year-
“Our forensic crime scene ing tenfold.” evidence will be preserved affect decomposition and old principal at a local el-
investigators will get pre- Dr. Erin Kimmerle, a forensic and breakthroughs made evidence. After the bodies ementary school, died in
mium training as a result anthropologist at USF, pre- in real-life-cases. The re- are studied, the skeletons a car wreck in January. His
of this,” said former Pasco dicts that by studying how search also would benefit will be cleaned and pre- widow Abigail Kennedy
County Sheriff Bob White. bodies react in Florida’s other countries with sub- served and made avail- said her husband always
tropical and tropical cli- able for future research. wanted to donate his body
mates, she said. “The legacy of the dona- to science. On Friday, she
Bodies are obtained by tions, it is forever,” said Kim- spoke to a crowd at the fo-
donation. The first four will merle. rensics field.
be buried next week, and About 30 people have al- “There’s so much bitter-
in January, Kimmerle and ready filled out paperwork sweet in all of this. Adam
other researchers will hold to donate their bodies to wanted to continue teach-
a course for detectives on the farm when they die. ing after his death,” she
exhumation. Later, other Kimmerle said if someone said. “It would be my last
bodies will be exposed to who wants to donate dies gift to education, he’d
water and buried during within 200 miles of the facil- say. This couldn’t be more
different seasons to deter- ity, researchers will pick up perfect.”q