"In a small village located deep inside the huge Truong Son mountain range, it is not shocking to find 40 items of UXO after only one week’s work. To put it another way, this is equivalent to one piece of UXO for every family in the village, or one piece of UXO for every 25 metres of the main village pathway!"
- By Le Xuan Tung, MAG Mine Action Team, Quang Tri, Vietnam
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Crossing the streams, chopping trees, and slogging through the gloomy forest, we became close friends with this lonely area. |
Early morning in Dakrong, a poor, mountainous part of Quang Tri province, close to the border with Lao PDR. We, MIne Action Team Number 1, had taken two hours to cover 80 kilometres in the Truong Son mountain range.
At an altitude of 1,000 metres, this is a very cool place all year round. Van Kieu and Paco ethnic groups live in this poor part of Vietnam, where the impact of war is still visible today.
Mr Ho K, the head of Coc village, presented us on arrival with a long list of sites where unexploded ordnance (UXO) was located, or suspected (we had contacted him before to arrange this clearance task.) Ho K also told us that some people in his village had collected bombs to earn some money [by selling the bomb casing as scrap metal] and as a result some terrible accidents had occurred.
I noted this down and underlined it to share with my other team members. It would be useful to provide some advice to the local residents when collecting information from them.
In remote mountainous areas, wherever streams and rivers have obstructed the way people have to use boats to cross or just walk through. Coc village is no exception. Crossing the streams, chopping trees, and slogging through the gloomy forest, we became close friends with this lonely area.
And what did our friendship bring us in return? Leeches!
View Dakrong in a larger map |
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Truong Son range in Vietnam is a huge mountain range over 1,000km long and up to 200km wide in parts. Part of the Ho Chi Minh Trail ran along the mountain range. The trail facilitated the movement of soldiers and war supplies from North Vietnam to battlefields in South Vietnam. |
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Imagine that one day you get out of your car at the place where you work and after two minutes you look down at your feet and see leeches. Many people can’t imagine it, I bet! I was pretty alarmed to see a handful of leeches latching on to my skin and enjoying a bloody meal on my feet.
It is even more horrible in the middle of the forest. Whenever our bodies brushed against a tree branch, dozens of leeches seemed to jump on us from the tree, creating a trembling sound as they hit the ground. Every few steps, we had to stop to pick them off our ankles and legs, but they were full of blood already. The leech repellent we brought along was completely useless.
I have been working for MAG for nine years, helping to clear and remove thousands of bombs and other items of UXO. This is only my rough estimate, but such a high number is likely as we are working in areas where there were harsh conflicts, and where the US set up many bases.
So, in a small village located deep inside the huge Truong Son mountain range, it is not shocking to find 40 items of UXO after only one week’s work. To put it another way, this is equivalent to one piece of UXO for every family in the village, or one piece of UXO for every 25 metres of the main village pathway!
The moment of farewell. A firm handshake with the village head. Left deep in my mind is a week of living and working here, a week of being proud to be MAG staff.
What else should be recalled? Well, I don’t really want to mention those bloodsuckers again, they give me the creeps!
20 July 09
Latest news from Vietnam:
- First underwater bomb destroyed MAG has demolished a 500-pound bomb that local fishermen found embedded in a coral reef at the seaside resort of Da Nhay in Quang Binh province, central Vietnam. (15 July 09)
- MAG helps secure safety of UNESCO World Heritage site Until recently, communities in Nha-Ke Bang National Park could not access all the agricultural land they needed as it was heavily contaminated with unexploded ordnance. (8 July 09)
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- Donate to MAG online - more than 90 per cent of MAG's income is spent directly on clearance programmes
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