Richard Stevens, a former UK Army bomb disposal officer, is seeking to set up his own civilian bomb disposal database. His aim; to help dog handlers, divers, risk managers and others identify and report ‘remnants of war’, to prevent injury and death. From his home near Southampton he writes:
When I was an EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) operator in the Army I now realise how comfortable I was as a bomb technician. OK, I had some scary moments and lived in some very uncomfortable conditions, but now I’ve been a civilian EOD operator for just over three years I see a marked difference in support for technicians in the civvie EOD industry. In the Army you can generally blow most things up and you have a group of colleagues, technical publications, the ASH data-base and a network of specialists to help and back you up if you have a problem. In the civvie industry you are generally on your own and possibly with no explosives. On leaving the Army I worked for both commercial and non-Governmental organisations (NGOs). None of these, commercial or NGO, provided any technical support or render safe procedures. You were expected to already have all the knowledge and technical expertise in your head. On the unfortunate death of a fellow de-miner in Libya and the need for technical info on the Chinese T-84 (land-mine) it was clear to me that a civilian ERW (Explosive Remnants of War) database was required. Populated and maintained collectively by EOD operators on the civilian ERW clearance circuit. Here is my effort in making that happen. I’ve started a Kickstarter Project to see if we can collectively fund the new civilian ERW database.”
To see Richard’s project visit the KickStarter website: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1631978918/cat-uxo-explosive-remnants-of-war-erw-data-base
Visit also http://www.cat-uxo.com
Stevens is pictured in South Sudan; he has also done bomb disposal work in Libya, Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan.
