Partners in safety: Mr. Tran Van Nam (left) guides NPA/RENEW EOD team member Nguyen Duc Hoa to a discovery site in Xuan Hoa Village.

GIO LINH — On Wednesday, February 25, 2026, the NPA/RENEW EOD team successfully conducted five consecutive emergency tasks in Gio Linh Commune. The operations resulted in the recovery of six items of unexploded ordnance (UXO), showcasing a vital shift in community behavior from risk-taking to proactive reporting.

A Lesson in Safety: The Power of Education

This 60mm mortar was found and marked by a 10th-grade student. Reporting such items is crucial in preventing accidents.

Among the morning’s urgent callouts, a discovery in Xuan Hoa Village highlighted the life-saving impact of Mine Risk Education (MRE). A 10th-grade student spotted a suspicious object in a barren garden near his home while on his way to school. Applying his safety training, the student used an old helmet to clearly mark the location, informed his parents, and used his mobile phone to call the provincial hotline managed by the Quang Tri Mine Action Center (QTMAC).

Because the student had marked the spot so effectively, the NPA/RENEW EOD team was able to locate the item quickly upon arrival. The team was met by the student’s father, Mr. Tran Van Nam (born 1985), who guided the technicians to the marked spot where a 60mm mortar was recovered. Mr. Nam then led the team to a second location near a village fish pond, where an additional 81mm mortar was found. Both items were secured for safe disposal.

Context: Breaking the Cycle of High-Risk Behavior

The student’s decision to mark and report represents a crucial change in community behavior. Data from QTMAC regarding the former Quang Tri Province (prior to its administrative merger with Quang Binh) underscores the gravity of the risks still present. Between 2022 and 2024, five male residents—aged 15, 34, 43, 44, and 50—fell victim to UXO accidents.

Tragically, three of these accidents were fatal. Data shows that in four out of these five cases, the victims had deliberately touched or attempted to dismantle the ordnance while foraging or digging. Notably, the youngest victim in these records was 15 years old—the same age as the student who safely reported the ordnance in Xuan Hoa. This contrast proves that MRE is successfully turning potential victims into community lifesavers and serving as a vital early warning system for the QTMAC-coordinated network.

This life-saving behavior is the result of a long-standing commitment to safety in the province. Since 2015, the Government of Ireland has provided sustained funding for Project RENEW’s MRE programs. This decade of support has ensured that an entire generation of children—like Mr. Nam’s son—has grown up with the knowledge and skills to stay safe in an environment still impacted by war legacies.

Chronology of a Busy Morning: Safeguarding Homes and Livelihoods

The NPA/RENEW EOD team’s high-activity day actually began earlier that morning in Long Hai Village. Following a hotline report, the team first met 21-year-old Le Hoang Khanh, who discovered two massive 155mm High Explosive (HE) artillery shells while clearing his family’s back garden. With his parents working in another province, Khanh took the initiative to ensure his home was safe by calling for professional help.

High-explosive threat: Team Leader Hoang Kim Chien inspects two massive 155mm artillery shells found in a residential garden in Long Hai Village.

Following the tasks at Mr. Nam’s house in Xuan Hoa, the team responded to two more reports:

• Construction Safety: Also in Xuan Hoa Village, Mr. Le Anh Quoc discovered a 105mm artillery shell lying immediately adjacent to a busy village road while clearing land for a new building. He approached the EOD team directly in the field to report the finding.

• Livelihood Support: In Truc Lam Village, Mr. Tran Xuan Hieu discovered a 60mm mortar shell exposed in the mud while draining a fish pond for a new crop. The team’s rapid response allowed Mr. Hieu to continue his work safely.

By midday, all six explosive items had been successfully recovered and transported to the central demolition site for safe disposal. The partnership between vigilant residents, QTMAC coordination, and the NPA/RENEW EOD team remains the foundation of a safer future for the people of Gio Linh.

We sincerely thank the Government of the United States 🇺🇸 through the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi, the Government of Norway 🇳🇴, and the Government of Ireland 🇮🇪 through the Embassy of Ireland in Vietnam for their valuable support to our meaningful humanitarian mission in Vietnam 🇻🇳.

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Gio Linh, Quang Tri (13 March 2019): A family in Gio Linh Townlet today feel relieved after 25 mortar rounds have been safely removed from their new house under construction by a mobile Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team managed by Project RENEW and Norwegian People’s Aid (RENEW-NPA).

Mr. Tran Vinh Thanh Danh, a resident of Quarter 6 of Gio Linh Townlet, expressed his gratitude to the NPA-Project RENEW team who had arrived at his construction site early on Wednesday morning to deal with the ordnance.

“We are so glad because we now feel safe on our own land,” said the 39-year-old father of three. “Thanks to the team’s quick response, my workers can continue working with peace of mind,” he added.

According to Team Leader Truong Van Vien who is in charge of NPA-Project RENEW’s EOD Team No. 3, the task on Wednesday morning was to respond to an emergency call to the Quang Tri Mine Action Center. “Because most of these mortar rounds are unfired and others lost fuzes, our team will transport them to our disposal site for safe destruction,” said Team Leader Vien.  

As the northernmost district of Quang Tri Province during the Vietnam War, Gio Linh was the host of the former U.S Marine Corps Firebase, which formed one corner of what became known as Leatherneck Square, with the other corners being Con Thien, Cam Lộ Combat Base and Đông Hà Combat Base.

Since 1975, explosive remnants of war (ERW) have caused 275 fatalities and 891 injuries in Gio Linh District. The latest explosion occurred on 23 June 2015 in Trung Son Commune, killing a 42-year-old man, father of three, while he was attempting to dismantle a projectile.

During the past four years, EOD teams managed by NPA-Project RENEW have found and safely destroyed nearly 2,000 cluster munitions and other UXO in Gio Linh District.

Project RENEW was established in 2001 as a joint effort between the government of Quang Tri Province and interested INGOs to “restore the environment and neutralize the effects of the war” – with the main focus on unexploded ordinance.

Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) is one of the leading organizations worldwide in humanitarian disarmament. NPA has worked in Vietnam since 2008 following the signing of an MOU with the government of Quang Tri People’s Committee to support the development of Project RENEW’s Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) capacity. NPA’s operational footprint now covers all of Quang Tri and Thua Thien Hue Provinces, with an increase of assets to four Battle Area Clearance teams, one Non-Technical Survey team, four EOD teams, and 25 Technical Survey teams.

Project RENEW
Trieu Phong and Cam Lo Districts, Quang Tri Province
15 January 2015

In the first week of the New Year 2015, 160 items of unexploded ordnance (UXO) were safely removed by RENEW’s mobile Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) teams from people’s gardens, rice fields, plantations and roadsides in two districts of Quang Tri Province, Cam Lo and Trieu Phong.

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Most of the munitions, 141 of them, were destroyed thanks to the alert awareness of local people who have become the “eyes and ears” of RENEW EOD teams over the years.  Using Project RENEW’s toll-free hotline telephone number, 355411, local residents called 24 times last week to report UXO discoveries to Project RENEW teams.

Five items of UXO, including one mortar, one hand grenade, two 40mm grenades and one projectile, await demolition in An Thai Village of Cam Tuyen Commune after RENEW’s EOD Team No. 3 responded to three UXO callouts on 5 January 2014.

Last Tuesday in An Hung Village, members of the Le family were renovating the temple for the upcoming Lunar New Year festival when they suddenly found a cluster bomb, locally known as a bombie, adjacent to the structure.  Mr. Le Van Thuc picked up his cell phone and immediately reported the sighting to RENEW. Half an hour later, a RENEW EOD team arrived and safely destroyed the bomb in place.

EOD team members preparing for safe disposal of the cluster bomb found near a family temple in An Hung Village.

The same day, Tran Huu Ha, a Youth Union officer in Cam Hieu Commune, ran into two youngsters who were collecting wild vegetables.  They had found some UXOs they were trying to dismantle.  Ha stopped them immediately.  “I know how dangerous these unexploded projectiles are,” he said.  “They are very unstable and may explode if disturbed, so I asked the boys to stop and I called Project RENEW immediately.” Ha is a member of RENEW’s Community Reporting Network which educates people about UXO risks and encourages them to report UXO sightings to RENEW for timely and safe removal.

EOD Team Leader Duong Duc Tam coordinated with Ha and followed his directions to the site of the munitions, where they found a cache of unexploded projectiles, some of which had been unearthed by the two boys who thought they might sell the scrap for extra money.

“Obviously that was a cache of UXO,” said Team Leader Tam.  “It took our team the rest of today to investigate and remove all the muntions.  Thanks to Mr. Ha’s prompt action,” he added, “we may have prevented a tragic accident from happening.”

A total of 105 items of 37mm projectiles which RENEW’s EOD team determined were stable enough to move, were safely transported from the location of this cache to RENEW’s central demolition site for later destruction.

The past five years have seen a measurable reduction of UXO accidents in Quang Tri Province.  However, the most recent accidents were mainly related to scrap metal scavenging.  In 2014, Quang Tri recorded four accidents which resulted in eight injuries.  Five of the injuries occurred in an explosion at a scrap yard as workers were loading scrap material onto a truck.

It is essential to sustain public and school-based Risk Education campaigns to reinforce people’s awareness of UXO threats.  UXO cleanup will have to continue for years to come in Quang Tri Province, but in the meantime Quang Tri residents can be safe, if they understand how to protect themselves and their families from injury and death and how to report munitions for safe removal and destruction.