Scrap Metal

I watched a fascinating program last night on an Australian station SBS. It was about an Australian man living in Laos, training local bomb squads to disarm munitions that have been left scattered about the country since the Vietnam War ended 35 years ago. I had always known that there were problems in the region with ordinance but I never knew to what extent.

I felt is deserves coverage.

Did you know?

Between 1964 and 1973 there were 580,000 B-52 missions flown over Laos and Cambodia, but mostly over Laos targeting the Ho-Chi-Minh trail?

The B-52 D and G models used for area carpet bombing missions could carry 108, 500 lbs bombs internally and externally, dropping them from an altitude of 35,000 feet?

According to my calculations that was 62,640,000 bombs dropped over Laos during a nine year period. This excludes other type aircraft sorties.

Of this, roughly 5 - 10 % of all bombs dropped were "duds" and left peppered over a country roughly the size of Florida. That means that they are littered with between 3 and 6 million 500 pound bombs, not to mention the deadliest threat to children, cluster munitions.

Cluster munitions are large bombs packed with hundreds of small, grenade sized bomblets, packed with ball bearings. They were used in large numbers indiscriminately through the jungle to take out large areas of living things. These are literally everywhere, lying around in a state of decay and instability. The worse part is that they look like a toy or a small ball to little kids who pick them up and get themselves blown to bits.

Laos is a poor country, most of the people live well below the poverty line and see any kind of scrap metal as a commodity, villagers find bombs and try to recover the scrap metal and end up killing themselves or maiming themselves in the process. It is a huge problem.

Laos has an amputation rate 600% higher than any other country in the world.


I am glad this Australian man is helping the people of Laos, I just wish I was watching a program about Americans cleaning up our own bombs instead.


Next Post will be bout something more positive, I promise.