This story follows the 22 September 2026 report on the safe disposal of the MK82 bomb, published on NPA Vietnam’s Facebook page.
On the morning of 16 September 2026, NPA/RENEW team member Phạm Xuân Sang was searching a rubber and lemongrass plantation farmed by Mr. Nguyễn Văn Bòn in Gio An Tây village, Cồn Tiên commune, Quảng Trị Province, when his detector registered an unusually strong signal that suggested a larger item could be buried beneath the ground.
“When I detected the signal, I could see it covered a wide area,” Sang said. “I sensed there was something big down there, so I followed the procedure.”
Once uncovered, the item was reported, and Provincial Operations Manager Mai Văn Việt and EOD team leader Hoàng Kim Chiến identified it as an MK82 aerial bomb weighing approximately 227 kilograms (500 pounds) and containing roughly 87 kilograms of Tritonal explosive. Lying below the surface, this unseen danger had remained hidden beneath land that Mr. Bòn’s family had farmed for years.
That same day, the team safely removed and transported the bomb to NPA/RENEW’s Central Demolition Site in Vĩnh Định commune and safely demolished it at 11:40 AM.
Two weeks later, we returned to Gio An Tây to hear from the people who live and work there about what the discovery meant to them.
“The consequences would not fall on one or two people”
Mr. Lê Quang Gián, chief of Gio An Tây village, said the area saw fierce fighting during the war, and that explosive remnants are still common despite many years have passed. Many people in the village, from the elderly to the middle-aged and younger residents, still live with injuries from bombs and shells.
“For a bomb of that size to be found by the team is something to be truly glad about, because its destructive power is enormous,” he said. “When people reclaim land, if someone happened to strike it, the consequences would not fall on one or two people. Many people would be affected, and it would spread fear through the village.”
The village regularly reminds residents to report any suspected item to the authorities and never to touch or move it themselves.
Back to work on safe ground
Clearance at the site began on 5 August 2026 and is expected to finish by 21 October 2026, with about 695,088 square metres of land being released back to the community once completed. Mr. Gián said many plots in the village have never been worked. Once they are cleared, he said, families can farm with confidence and even bring in machinery to open up the land.
One of those plots belongs to 68-year-old Mrs. Nguyễn Thị Thiết. When we met her, she was weeding her 1.5 hectares of land, which was located within the task area, to prepare for a new crop of acacia.
For years, she said, the thought of what lay under her hoe “sent a chill through me.” In the past, she explained, people often took the risk of gathering the items they found in their gardens into one pile, just so they could keep farming. “In the old days, I didn’t dare to dig hard, for fear of hitting a bomb.”
“Today I feel at ease,” she said. “I can dig deeper and wider.”
Her message to the clearance teams was short: “Thank you for working so hard to bring safety to the people of our village.”
“True to our mission”
Sang has worked with NPA/RENEW since 2018. For him, finding the MK82 was more than a technical achievement.
“I did something that is true to the mission of our organisation,” he said. “Helping people farm their land more safely.”
His advice to residents echoes the village chief’s: “To keep yourself and the people around you safe, if you find anything you suspect is explosive, report it to the authorities or call the hotline 0901 941 941.”
NPA sincerely thanks the Government of the United States 🇺🇸 through the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi, and the Government of Norway 🇳🇴, for the valuable support to our meaningful mine action work in Vietnam 🇻🇳.
