Safe bomb removal in Dien Bien
VOV.VN - The Military Command of Dien Bien city and sappers from the Military High Command of northern mountainous province of Dien Bien have safely defused an over 300-kg bomb left over during the war in Vietnam.
The bomb dropped by the US troops was discovered on March 2 in the foot of a hill near a residential area in Him Lam ward by a local man when he was clearing the slid land in his backyard.
The Technology Centre for Bomb and Mine Disposal under the Engineering Command, up to 7,645 of the 8,686 communes in Vietnam’s 63 provinces and cities are polluted with unexploded ordnance (UXOs).
The US army used more than 15 million tonnes of bombs and mines in the war in Vietnam, four times the amount used in World War II. As a result, Vietnam has been listed among the countries most contaminated with UXOs.
According to the National Steering Committee for Recovery over Postwar Bomb and Landmine Impacts, roughly 800,000 tonnes of UXOs are scattering across 6.6 million hectares, or 20.12 percent of the country’s land, primarily in the central region.