Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by janrinok on Tuesday July 14 2015, @09:50AM   Printer-friendly
from the I-award-you-the-Order-of-the-Rat dept.

Rats trained to sniff out landmines in Cambodia
Unexploded devices said to have killed nearly 20,000 Cambodians and wounded 44,000 since 1979

Pit, only two and with just one eye, needed only 11 minutes before he detected a deadly mine buried in a Cambodian field, work that humans with metal detectors could have taken up to five days to investigate. But Pit is not human. He is part of a team of elite rats, imported from Africa, that Cambodia is training to sniff out landmines that still dot the countryside after decades of conflict.

"Under a clear sky, he would have been quicker," said Hul Sokheng, a veteran Cambodian deminer, who oversees training of 12 handlers on how to work with 15 large rats to clear Cambodia's farmland and rural villages of bombs. "These are life-saving rats," he said under rainy skies.

Their work could prove vital in a country where unexploded devices, including mines and unexploded shells, have killed nearly 20,000 Cambodians and wounded about 44,000 since 1979, according to the Cambodian government. Pit is able to smell highly explosive TNT inside landmines, watched over by two handlers who tie him up to a rope as the one-eyed rat searches through the grass.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/rats-trained-to-sniff-out-landmines-in-cambodia-1.3149277?cmp=rss

This particular story is "current events", sure enough - but I did a search for these rats and found several other, older stories.

http://www.vice.com/read/this-ngo-trains-giant-rats-to-clear-mine-fields-182

This story is especially interesting, http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/africa/09/07/herorats.detect.landmines/index.html. "Nailing down the regimen was tricky. At one point in APOPO's early days, the rats performed perfectly in trials, making Weetjens suspicious. It turned out the rats were outsmarting the humans."

Oh, not just explosives, but diseases too: http://www.occupyforanimals.net/rats---the-apopo-herorats-detect-landmines-and-tuberculosis.html

Lots more stories here: https://www.apopo.org/en/. So - can we expect to see TSA handlers walking around our airports, with rats on leashes soon?


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 1, Offtopic) by c0lo on Tuesday July 14 2015, @11:45AM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2015, @11:45AM (#208828) Journal

    Guys, can you please check the status of this [soylentnews.org] submission?
    Look, I don't mind if you reject it but, in my list, it appears "accepted" with a pubdate of Thursday January 01 1970, @12:00AM. Does rehash have a (non-critical) bug and accepts pub dates in the past - or... do you really mean it (is your sense of humour weirder than mine [soylentnews.org]?)

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   -1  
       Offtopic=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Offtopic' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   1  
  • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 14 2015, @11:54AM

    by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2015, @11:54AM (#208832) Journal

    It has been rejected - I'm not even sure where you are seeing this story. It doesn't feature on my submission list nor in the released stories. So, while there might be a bug, a bit more information would help pin it down. Thanks.

    • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:07PM

      by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:07PM (#208840) Journal

      OK c0lo, I'm trying to sort this out. It does indicate as accepted but the date time is as you suggest. It is common practice to move stories that make the story list but are then rejected by the 2nd editor to a date in the past - to a black hole if you will. I'm trying to find out who processed the story and why it was marked as such. It might simply be a typo which made the date unreadable.

      It would have helped if you had not sent your query in as a submission - it didn't make sense to me which resulted in your query being rejected. We are all contactable via the usual SN email addresses or via IRC. Alternatively, if you must send a question in as a sub - mark it clearly and please explain what the problem is. You comments about time rifts, Einstein and parallel universes, along with a confusing subject, ensured that you query was binned.

    • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:08PM

      by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:08PM (#208842) Journal
      Since I'm the submitter, I'm seeing it in my list of submission, in green/accepted. A "JSON translation" of the line looks like

      { "title" : "Blade Runner miniature props", "timestamp" : "Monday July 13, @08:56PM", "state" :"Accepted", "pub date" : "Thursday January 01 1970, @12:00AM" }

      Even more, visiting the submission [soylentnews.org], I read the second line as "Accepted submission by c0lo at 2015-07-13 20:56:56". Maybe it would worth looking into the DB?

      --
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
      • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:18PM

        by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:18PM (#208851) Journal

        c0lo - it was rejected as a Dupe by the 2nd Editor.

        • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:30PM

          by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2015, @12:30PM (#208854) Journal

          Thanks, I googled for blade runner on soylentnews and saw the duped TFA 4 moths ago. (it still doesn't explain why I'm seeing it with an Accepted state in my submission list. Non-critical anyway)

          --
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by takyon on Tuesday July 14 2015, @01:31PM

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday July 14 2015, @01:31PM (#208874) Journal

    It was accepted, someone realized it was a dupe, in order to get rid of it the date was set to 0.

    --
    [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]