22/07/2023 Vietnam
“If you ever come across anything suspicious like this item, please do not pick it up, contact your local law and/or enforcement agency for assistance”.
(Web editor: Zhang Kaiwei, Liang Jun)
July 16 (Xinhua) — On their way home from school in Vietnam’s northern Son La province, two boys unknowingly picked up a strange metal object which turned out to be an unexploded cluster bomblet left over from the Vietnam War. Initially mistaking it for a toy, Vi Hoang Khai and his brother Vi Hoang Khiem carried the object home. When they accidentally dropped it, the bomblet exploded, causing severe injuries to both children. Doctors said too many fragments and steel pellets landed on or through our kids’ bodies, causing serious injuries to their livers, stomachs, intestines and legs. Thanks to the doctors’ great efforts hour by hour, day by day, our kids eventually escaped death,” the victims’ father Vi Van Quyen, an electricity worker, recalled. Quyen’s family has suffered a lot since the accident occurred in August 2022. But they consider themselves fortunate compared to many others who have lost their lives or suffered life-altering injuries due to unexploded ordnance (UXO) from the Vietnam War. Do Thi Thu, a civil servant in the police sector in the central highlands province of Kon Tum, shared a heart-wrenching story about two boys from her neighbor’s family. Long time ago, two siblings from my neighbor’s family went to herd ducks in the paddy field, picked up some cluster bomblets and played with them as toys. A bomblet exploded, killing the elder brother and injuring the younger brother,” Thu said. Losing an eye and an arm in the explosion, he has since endured many physical and mental pains and lives with a constant fear of similar incidents.” When working in his cassava field, A Nhi, a 24-year-old farmer in Kon Tum’s Dak Ha district, found unexploded ammunition and brought it to the house of his father-in-law. He hit the ammunition with a machete to check the content inside, but it suddenly exploded, killing him instantly. Later, his injured four-year-old son and his wife’s younger brother died in hospital. The most painful thing is that children make up the majority of UXO victims. With their hyperactive nature and lack of understanding, they often play with, move and throw UXO, especially cluster bomblets, leading to explosions,” Thu told Xinhua. These devastating incidents are not limited to children alone. Among the victims are individuals involved in collecting scrap metal, including breadwinners who rely on this perilous occupation for their livelihood. On March 22, 2022, a 41-year-old scrap collector in Quang Xuong district of the central Thanh Hoa province was killed when the UXO he was sawing exploded. On Aug. 18, 2017, a UXO exploded when people in Khanh Son district of the central Khanh Hoa province mistook it for metal and exploded. The blast killed six people, including four children, on the spot. On March 19, 2016, scrap dealers in Ha Dong district in the capital city of Hanoi attempting to extract metal from a 100+ kg unexploded bomb triggered a fatal explosion, killing four people, injuring 10 others, and damaging 131 apartments. Tragedies associated with UXO have occurred in various cities and provinces across Vietnam for many years. The Vietnam War ended in 1975 after a nearly two-decade conflict, but according to a recent survey by the Technology Center for Bomb and Mine Disposal under the Vietnamese Army’s Engineering Command, over 2,000 people die or get maimed from UXO explosions nationwide every year. The survey categorizes the cause of these explosions, with 38 percent resulting from children playing with UXO, 30 percent from scrap collectors sawing them for salvage, and 18 percent from accidental ignition by individuals, such as farmers hoeing in their paddy fields.
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Dear editors, Biography of a bomb is aimed at highlighting the danger caused by unexploded bombs. Moreover, the most important aspect is that we work completely non profit, what drives us is raising awerness about this topic. We make use of your pictures and articles, but we need them to put a context in how findings are done. We trust in your understanding. We will (and we always do) cite the source and the author. We thank you for your comprehension.
