An RBK 250-275 cluster munitions dispenser that the Syrian Air Force did not manage to use. From Taftanaz Air Base, which was overrun by opposition fighters in January. By the author. Earlier this year.
(Source: cjchivers)
at James Madison University
Israeli soldier killed during land mine clearing near Syrian border
The IDF soldier was taking part in a standard advanced training course when an old land mine exploded.
Soldiers searching for remains of fellow soldier in minefield. Photo by Gil Eliyahu.
An Israel Defense Forces soldier was killed Tuesday afternoon during a training course while removing a land mine in the Golan Heights.
Private Roey Yisrael Alfi, 19, and his unit were undergoing a standard advanced training course near Moshav Yonatan when an old land mine exploded, causing his death. This was an anti-tank land mine expected to explode only as a result of a heavy vehicle, such as an APC or a tank, driving over it.
It is still unclear why the land mine exploded but initial evaluations point to a technical malfunction. An official involved in the investigation said such an accident has not occurred in several years.
Bees In Croatia Being Trained To Find Land Mines
ZAGREB, Croatia — Mirjana Filipovic is still haunted by the land mine blast that killed her boyfriend and blew off her left leg while on a fishing trip nearly a decade ago. It happened in a field that was supposedly de-mined.
Now, unlikely heroes may be coming to the rescue to prevent similar tragedies: sugar-craving honeybees. Croatian researchers are training them to find unexploded mines littering their country and the rest of the Balkans.
When Croatia joins the European Union on July 1, in addition to the beauty of its aquamarine Adriatic sea, deep blue mountain lakes and lush green forests, it will also bring numerous un-cleared minefields to the bloc’s territory. About 750 square kilometers (466 square miles) are still suspected to be filled with mines from the Balkan wars in the 1990s.
RAINY SEASON is an intimate story about a family’s unexpected change of fate, set in the larger context of post-war Vietnam. A rubber tree-farming family in central Vietnam comes to grips with life after their youngest son finds a leftover American mortar while searching for grasshoppers. With unprecedented access and shot over five years, RAINY SEASON captures the land’s sumptuous beauty and reveals the far-reaching sorrow that it harbors.
India's 3,000 child soldiers:
“It has been reported that children of different age groups are trained and assigned different roles. The new entrants, aged from six to 12, are initially used as spies and couriers. They are also trained in basic drills and armed with .303 rifles. Children above 12 are used as fighters. They are trained to make and plant landmines and bombs, gather intelligence and for sentry duty. Young girls participate in the same drills as the boys. They are trained to lead operations from the front.”
The Humpty Dumpty Institute Trains Iraqi Filmmakers in Baghdad
The Humpty Dumpty Institute in partnership with the Iraqi Independent Film Centre (IIFC) conducted a workshop for 13 young Iraqi filmmakers in Baghdad from May 1-10. The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad funded the workshop with additional support coming from Iraq Al-Rafdin and Human Film UK/NL. The training was part of the International Film Exchange, a program of the Humpty Dumpty Institute that trains filmmakers with special promise from around the world and helps them use the power of film and television to highlight important social issues. In addition, the IFE raises awareness in the U.S. film industry about the struggles of promising filmmakers abroad when attempting to document those issues.
The theme of the Baghdad workshop was “Telling the Story”. It was designed to build upon a series of training activities conducted by IIFC beginning in January under the leadership of Iraqi’s most important filmmaker, Mohamed Al-Daradji (“Son of Babylon”). The workshop’s instructor, Bill Megalos, is a California-based filmmaker with more than 30 years experience producing and directing feature films and documentaries. Seven of the workshop participants are slated to travel to Los Angeles in June to take part in an intensive ten-day program at the UCLA School of Theatre, Film and Television. Participants in the UCLA program will receive a stipend allowing them to produce a short film of their own upon returning to Iraq.
Snake arms and crystal legs: Artificial limbs push boundaries of art
Mainstreaming disability with artistic artificial limbs
London (CNN) — With her flaming red hair, Marilyn Monroe figure, and lurid green snake casually coiled around the arm, Jo-Jo Cranfield looks like a real-life muse emerging from a Salvador Dali painting.
It’s impossible not to stare at the neon python on her left wrist. But take a closer look and you’ll discover that the reptile slithers in and out of the flesh like a psychedelic needle and thread.
Cranfield is an amputee. And her fantastical arm — described as everything from cool to creepy, and erotic — is the work of a London designer reinventing the way we see prosthetic limbs.
Sandia Offers Non-explosive Fertilizer Formula
A Sandia engineer who trained U.S. soldiers to avoid improvised explosive devices (IEDs) has developed a fertilizer that helps plants grow but can’t detonate a bomb. It’s an alternative to ammonium nitrate, an agricultural staple that is also the raw ingredient in most of the IEDs in Afghanistan.
Sandia has decided not to patent or license the formula, but to make it freely available in hopes of saving lives.
Ammonium nitrate fertilizer is illegal in Afghanistan but legal in neighboring Pakistan, where a quarter of the gross domestic product and half the workforce depend on agriculture. When mixed with a fuel such as diesel, ammonium nitrate is highly explosive. It was used in about 65 percent of the 16,300 homemade bombs in Afghanistan in 2012, according to government reports. There were 9,300 IED events in the country in 2009.
South Africa company unveils new mine-protected products
South Africa’s globally respected specialist mine protection and demining company, Denel Mechem, made two major announcements last month. The first was of the company’s development of a new-generation version of the renowned Casspir mine-protected vehicle, the Casspir NG 2000. The second was of the develop- ment of a new multipurpose truck fitted with a new mine-protected cab.
The Casspir first entered service in 1979 and since then has seen service around the world with the United Nations (UN), various police forces and private security companies, as well as with the South African National Defence Force (SANDF). “The basic, reliable features of the Casspir remain the same,” affirms Denel Mechem GM Ashley Williams. “It has always been the world leader in its class – providing unequalled protection against landmines, roadside bombs and automatic rifle fire. Now we have improved the hull protection by using a higher quality of steel, increased its power, improved the accessibility for passengers and mounted it on a more versatile and reliable vehicle platform.”
The Casspir NG 2000 can resist the blast of 14 kg of explosives – equivalent to more than two landmines – under each wheel. It comes in two versions. One uses a Mercedes-Benz drivetrain while the other, designated the NG 2000B, uses a Powerstar engine as its platform. The result is improved power and manoeuvrability.
Did NATO Kill These Afghans With Air-Burst Ordnance?
Alissa Rubin (@alissanyt) examines the deaths of at least 17 women and children in Kunar Province; their bodies were discovered after a vicious firefight on April 5 and 6 in which a CIA officer was killed and his unit pinned down and nearly overrun. A glimpse at a failed joint CIA-Afghan operation, which went “catastrophically awry,” ending in blood, recrimination and sorrow.
NATO’s rules for airstrikes allow Western and Afghan forces to call for ordnance with air-burst fuzes, which convert a standard air-delivered bomb (a weapon that with guidance systems and delayed fuzing can be extraordinarily precise and reasonably discriminate) into a much more dangerous and often indiscriminate means of killing. But these weapons are almost never the first choice. They are typically used when a ground unit is desperate and wants many targets hit or suppressed at once. The downside is that ordnance configured in such fashion carries grave risks to any friendly units or civilian lives and property nearby.
To clear up the many lingering questions, NATO might release all of the weapons systems video from the airstrikes in this fight, and might explain which fuzes and fuze settings were used for each piece of ordnance. Thus far, its denials of responsibility — and its insistence that the Taliban may have smothered the victims (an allegation presented without evidence) — are unconvincing.
ABOUT THE PHOTOGRAPH
By Meer Afzal/European Pressphoto Agency.
(Source: cjchivers)
