Mitch Muddles Removal.

• Author: Conaway, Janelle
• Position: Brief Article

An OAS-coordinated effort to remove land mines from Central America was dealt a temporary setback by Hurricane Mitch. The heavy rains, mudslides, and swollen rivers that caused so much death and destruction also dislodged an unknown number of the antipersonnel mines that have been buried in the region since the conflicts of the 1980s.

Since the hurricane hit last October, experts working in mine removal have been reevaluating their information about the location of the devices, according to William McDonough, senior consultant for the OAS Assistance Program for Detaining in Central America. The Nicaraguan government, in cooperation with the OAS, will host a conference in Managua in April to update the international community about progress made in the mine-removal projects under way in Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua.

In the weeks immediately following Hurricane Mitch, officials became concerned about public safety when two civilians were killed and another injured in Nicaragua, in incidents related to mines that had been disturbed and washed downstream. The Nicaraguan army dispatched an emergency detaining team, and an OAS response team traveled to the area to coordinate mine-removal plans with Nicaraguan authorities.

In the longer term, the hurricane also complicated operations because some international funds and logistical support were diverted from mine removal to more immediate emergencies, according to McDonough, a retired U.S. army colonel.

Detaining operations began to return to near-normal levels in January. The land-mine experts, known as sappers, are now receiving additional support from a team of specially trained dogs. With a sense of smell estimated to be one thousand times superior to that of humans, the dogs can detect the scent of buried explosives, making them useful allies in mine detection.

In a program funded by the U.S. State Department, sappers from Nicaragua, Honduras, and Costa Rica completed...