We are living in an age of unprecedented peace and prosperity, but let us not kid ourselves – there are still parts of the world which are torn by civil wars as well as abject poverty. Landmines also pose a huge issue in affected areas, long after the drums of war have subsided, but what has been left behind by the previous regime still remains. Well, Colombia is one such countries, where years of guerrilla warfare have seen plenty of landmines remain buried underneath. Meant to protect certain plantations or other structures in the past, these have resulted in the death of over 10,000 civilians and soldiers alike since 1990. Removing landmines is a dangerous job, but Bogota design firm Lemur Studio intends to deliver on their SaveOneLife project.
The SaveOneLife project happens to be a mine detector that will be able to fit into the insides of a shoe. It is made out of a small coil of printed conductive material, where it will be able to produce an electromagnetic field. This particular field will interact with other electromagnetic fields that are created by large pieces of metal (landmines fall under this particular category, of course), where a tiny wristband which users wear will then be alerted of a possible nearby landmine. Red dots on the wristband depict the landmines while green concentric circles would be the land around you.
One thing is for sure, this concept would hopefully be realized sooner rather than later, and it would be great if it had a 100% accuracy rate. I wonder whether there is a way to make plastic landmines though…
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