大象传媒

In recent days Ukraine has reclaimed swathes of occupied territory, forcing Russian troops to retreat. They have left behind expensive army equipment and vast numbers of land-mines. The military's key focus now is to make sure these regions are safe from planted mines, which could lead to deadly attacks if they explode.

One person who is trying to de-mine these re-taken areas is Ryan Hendrickson, a retired US Green Beret, who himself stepped on a mine in Afghanistan while serving in the US military. He recently cleared 334 explosive devices from one field, this took two weeks "it's very very slow". As harvest season is underway the threat to farmers and civilians has increased: "How we even find the fields is from civilians. Usually it's the civilians who come out and say... either we saw them place some mines here, or they've already hit mines in this area...now the numbers of civilians hitting these mines started to go up."

(Photo: Ryan Hendrickson by several explosives he has de-mined in Ukraine. Credit: Ryan Hendrickson)