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A Tumbleweed-Inspired Minesweeper: Mine Kafon by Massoud Hassani

By Ray Hu - November 21, 2012

in Social Impact

Designer Massoud Hassani hails from Qasaba, Kabul, amid a landscape ravaged and weaponized by landmines that still lurk in off-limits regions. Although the "Mine Kafon" dates back to 2011, when he presented it as his graduation project at Design Academy Eindhoven, the lo-fi de-miner was recently the subject of a short film by Focus Forward Films.

Like Theo Janssen's Strandbeests, the Mine Kafon moves with the wind; however, it's more like a tumbleweed or a clump of dandelion seeds than zephyr-powered locomotion. Hassani writes:When we were young we learned to make our own toys. One of my favourites was a small rolling object that was wind-powered. We used to race against the other kids on the fields around our neighbourhood. There was always a strong wind waving towards the mountains. While we were racing against each other, our toys rolled too fast and too far. Mostly they landed in areas where we couldn't go rescue them because of landmines. I still remember those toys I'd made that we lost and watching them just beyond where we could go.

The uncanny object loses a few 'legs' with each successful detonation and Hassani estimates that a single Mine Kafon can readily handle the onslaught of three or four mines—at about €40 ($51 as of press time) to make, this is upwards of 100 times less expensive than the current cost of roughly $1,200 per mine.

At Dutch Design Week 2011

At Designs of the Year 2012

The Mine Kafon was recently acquired by MoMA, which will exhibit Hassani's work in March 2013. He's currently seeking funding partners and collaborators to bring his brainchild into production—support the project here.

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Fabio

12 years ago

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Like Dan said: Systematic clearing is problematic with these objects. However, I can imagine theses sweepers would be used for "rough" clearing before the rest of the mine field will be swept with more accurate means. I guess it would still be worth it since these rough sweepers could be quite cheap.

Cool idea and certainly usable! (I think, no expert.)
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Brian

12 years ago

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If imagery, such as the technology used for finding oil deposits , has been put to use to discover hidden archaeology , certainly it could discover where all the land mines are . Its all about world leaders changing what is a priority for them . Kudos to you for putting them all to shame .
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Nick St.

12 years ago

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I have been talking to Hassani and he was able to tell me that the minesweeper gets tracked by GPS, that way the kafon can tell which area has been cleared.
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Ryan

12 years ago

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Great idea! I think the next steps are to develop a rolling pin shape that can be directed to quickly clear an area?
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angelo cannizzaro

12 years ago

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I quote all comments posted. So "congratulations for your great project" by my side too. I suggest to add a GPS tracking device on it, with that you can map safe areas on GIS platform.

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Tiago

12 years ago

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I've never commented on a post although I check this blog quite often.
I'm doing it right now because I needed to say "congratulations for your great project". I was amazed by your idea.
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Dan

12 years ago

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Pretty cool concept, I can't imagine growing up as a child confined by a no mans land full of deadly, mindless, soulless, indiscriminate killing devices. My biggest question/concern with this method/device would be that there is no way to track/mark which areas have been cleared and are now safe. Certainly it will detonate deadly mines, but with these things randomly blowing around whichever direction the wind blows them, it would make it extremely hard to systematically and methodically clear a specific area to be deemed safe. Is there potential that a false sense of security could be created?
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Eric

12 years ago

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Great, I think it needs a retrieval method or a rope or something to get it back..totally inspiring!
Well done!
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