Massoud Hassani's Mine Kafon

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By Adam Flaherty
Posted 2012/11/21 @ 2:00 am
Category Art & Design, Energy, General, Machining

Built using simple materials like bamboo and biodegradable plastic, Massoud Hassani‘s Mine Kafons are kinetic sculptures that save lives. Carried by the wind, the tumbling dandelion-shaped orbs cover large swaths of land scattered with abandoned land mines. As the plastic pads that cover its outer surface detonates the ordnance, the device absorbs the impact of the blast with minimal damage.

BY Adam Flaherty

I make cool stuff and write about other people making cool stuff on makezine.com. If you have something you think I should see, send me a tip.

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18 Responses to Massoud Hassani’s Mine Kafon

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Siewert Westerneng on November 21st, 2012 at 5:04 am said:

Great idea! I would also fit a GPS-logger inside so you would be able to see which parts of land were covered and should maybe considered save! Maybe also fit a sensor to detect and mark explosions?

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- Bashtarle (@Bashtarle) on November 21st, 2012 at 5:46 am said:
  
  I really wouldn’t consider anything that this device covers to be “safe”, simply too many random variables. Still its worthwhile if it detonates a single mine that otherwise probably would have been set off by a person, then it is worthwhile.
  
  I do think datalogging would be a huge boon, knowing where it detonated mines might help zero in on areas and concentrations which would allow for more effective gridded mine sweeping.
  
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  fabio.johner@bluewin.ch on November 21st, 2012 at 6:13 am said:
  
  follow the link to the project documentation:
  <>
  
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  fabio.johner@bluewin.ch on November 21st, 2012 at 6:15 am said:
  
  sry, wrong format.
  
  Here the text from the documentation:
  
  [...] a GPS chip [is] integrated in it. You can follow its movement on the website and see were it went, where are the safest paths to walk on and how many land mines are destroyed in that area. [...]
  
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  Woottoow on November 21st, 2012 at 6:21 am said:
  
  Totally agree here. Too many randoms.
  
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  Anton Christopher McInerney on November 21st, 2012 at 12:38 pm said:
  
  There are scanners that are amazingly accurate but cost and interest so far limit their use. The production of landmines by all nations needs to be outlawed now!
  
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  Arnold on November 21st, 2012 at 8:09 pm said:
  
  Good luck with that. Great in theory, but treaties are not worth the paper they are written on.
  
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  Bryan A on January 14th, 2013 at 5:46 pm said:
  
  Yes, there are many random variables. See this simulation of the mine kafons. As more are added into an area it appears that the effectiveness decreases. http://inhabitat.com/massoud-hassanis-mine-kafon-detonates-landmines-in-war-torn-areas/tots_massoud_hassani_mine_kafon-537×357/
  
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Jason Tardy (of AudioBody) on November 21st, 2012 at 5:51 am said:

Beautifully AWESOME!

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Bashtarle (@Bashtarle) on November 21st, 2012 at 6:00 am said:

It makes me sad, such an elegant thing with such a tragic purpose. Seeing things like this make me wish I lived in a world where interesting things like this didn’t have a purpose.

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Andrew Brannan on November 21st, 2012 at 9:25 am said:

I’ve got to imagine that for just a small bit more cost, the central cores could be fitted with a motor assembly and remote control to allow finer tuning of the search area. Actually, this seems the perfect application for some form of robot swarming technology. The problem comes when the kafons don’t identify any more mines. How can you be sure that there aren’t any more, or that a few didn’t detonate, but may still be active.

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- Anton Christopher McInerney on November 21st, 2012 at 12:41 pm said:
  
  The design could be adapted for terraforming as well seeding regions with new plant cover even for terraforming Mars!
  
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JamesRPatrick on November 21st, 2012 at 9:59 am said:

That’s an awesome invention. I’d like to see more footage of the explosions, though.

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zbys on June 9th, 2013 at 2:39 pm said:

A raspberry pi controlled, robotic version using cheap 2nd hand components from used mobile phones should be reasonably easy and cheap to build.The phones could provide video cameras and positioning systems (either using gps or wifi signal strength). Stepper motors could be salvaged from broken floppy disk drives.

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