Current American Issues-Gary Christ Brings His Landmine Clearing Crusade to MCC
The last Current American Issues program of the season, When is a War Really Over will feature Gary Christ and his campaign to clean up the millions of land mines left behind after decades of brutal warfare in Cambodia. The program will be on Wednesday, April 28 at 7 pm in Room A221 of McHenry County College.
Gary Christ is a local Crystal Lake inventor working to make a better world. In February of 2001, he began volunteering installing septic systems at orphanages in Cambodia. However, in 2004 a landmine was discovered at an orphanage he was asked to excavate. This dramatically changed his focus and he has been building prototypes of de-mining devices ever since.
Every day Cambodians are killed, maimed and threatened by millions of landmines and tons of unexploded ordnance left over from Southeast Asia's many conflicts, wars and invasions occurring from 1965-1998. Meeting dozens of Cambodians maimed by landmines, grieving the loss of a loved one or fearful of farming the land inspired Gary to revolutionize humanitarian demining methods for Cambodia's specific needs and realities. He calls his demining machine Peacehammer, "wherever it hammers, there will be a peaceful place to walk."
Gary also supports Angkor Association for the Disabled, a Cambodian landmine survivors group. Director Sem Sovantha is pictured above with Gary Christ in front of an early Peacehammer demining device, after testing near Siem Reap in 2008.
Educating people about the long term effects of warfare, as well as getting support for demining Cambodia, will be addressed in a new video format, known as Pecha-kucha.
This event is sponsored by the Student Peace Action Network (SPAN), Pax Christi, The McHenry County Peace Coalition, and Future Engineers and Scientists Society (FESS.)
It is free and open to the public.