Giant land mine sniffing rats of Mozambique
Historically reviled as vermin and carriers of plague, rats are not among the animals we count among the “friends of man”. But in Mozambique, Africa, an extraordinary relationship has developed between rat and man. Mozambique, long-troubled by war and civil unrest, remains riddled with deadly land mines, buried just inches below the earth. These land mines can remain “active” for years, and even in regions where relative peace has returned, there are casualties almost every day. The task of finding and removing the buried land mines is understandably a perilous job. The late Princess Diana was an outspoken advocate and supporter of those who risk so much to make Mozambique (and other African countries) safe for families and children again. After efforts to train dogs to detect the mines met with limited success (many dogs were blown up), a happy development finally came to this important work in the form of the lowly rat. An extremely large species of rat native to Mozambique and Gambia (Cricetomys Gambianus) was discovered to have a knack for detecting land mines. These rats take to the training much more readily than their dog counterparts, and are much lighter, so the incidences of “rat go boom” are low.