Project Sekong 2012: Mother killed attempting to expand garden.

The parents of these children felt they had no alternative but to work on contaminated land to expand their garden. The mother hit a bomblet and was killed. We are telling this family's story to villagers in Sekong but its not stopping other families from taking the same risk. We've already been called to fields to destroy ordnance that people here have uncovered while digging on uncleared land.

Report 11

When I witness people, impatient to expand their gardens, striking bomb-contaminated land with picks and shovels, I’m reminded of a family that I met a few years ago in Xieng Khuang Province.

The parents had three young children and were dependent on a small garden and rice field for their livelihood.  As the children grew so did their appetites and soon, the family’s needs could no longer be met on the wee parcel of productive land available to them.  The parents attempted to enlarge their rice field but no matter what direction they excavated, they unearthed cluster bomblets. They were encircled by refuse of war.

The parents chose the only alternative that held promise of increasing their harvest; they would remove a large termite mound that occupied several square feet of land in the center of the rice field.  Removing the mound would create just a tiny new planting area but that was better than nothing and the family was desperate for every handful of rice.

The parents worked with their hoes throughout the day, chipping away at the mound, slowly reducing it.  Late in the day, when the children grew cranky, the mother suggested that their father take them home and feed them.  She would continue working; she wanted the satisfaction at day’s end of seeing the job complete.

Just as the children and father turned to walk away from the mound the mother’s hoe hit a cluster bomblet long-buried in the mound; the device exploded, killing her instantly.  The father, just yards away, was hit in the back by shrapnel but survived.  Luckily, the children were shielded from the blast by their father’s body and escaped injury.

I’ve shared that family’s story many times here in rural Laos, whenever I see people working with mattocks and hoes on uncleared land.  But, in truth, my talking doesn’t deter much digging.  More than once people have told me that, yes, a bombie might kill them. Might.  But, starvation will kill them for sure.