These hero mice are being trained to rescue earthquake survivors

A scientist working with the Hero Rats Project is training rodents to navigate the ruins of an earthquake, and he has had promising results so far.

Dr. Donna Kean/Twitter Rats like these are being trained to save people.

For someone trapped in rubble after an earthquake, a mouse may be an unwelcome sight. But one scientist has been training mice to act as first responders, providing them with backpacks and small microphones so they can lead humans to earthquake survivors.

“Rats can get into small spaces to reach victims buried under rubble,” Dr. Donna Keane, who is developing the rat training program, told Newsweek. “They are very agile, and they are very good at navigating through all different types of environments. They are ideal for work-type search and rescue.”

Kane, who is based in Morogoro, Tanzania, East Africa, works on the so-called “Hero Rats” project along with a non-profit organization called APOPO. According to People, Kane trained seven mice to wear backpacks and navigate through phantom debris, then return to “base” when they heard a beep.

Backpacks for rats are cute – and useful. It contains microphones, video equipment, and location trackers. Once the rat reaches a person trapped by the earthquake, the above-ground human rescuers will be able to communicate with the survivor and locate them.

“We have the ability to talk to victims through rats,” Kane told Newsweek, explaining that a female seamstress was making small backpacks for rats. “It’s totally unusual.”

“We hope it saves lives, and the results are really promising,” she added to People.

The mice were wearing backpacks equipped with microphones, video equipment and location trackers to help rescuers assist quake survivors.

Some people may feel that their skin is crawling when they see a rat, but Ken insists that the rodent hasn’t earned its bad reputation. “There is a misconception that they are dirty and unhealthy,” she told Newsweek. “We take good care of them, they are social animals.”

Kane was originally interested in primate behavior but found herself drawn to the intelligence and ability of rats to learn. According to Newsweek, 170 mice are trained for a variety of tasks, including detecting landmines and detecting diseases such as tuberculosis. It took the seven mice that Keynes trained only two weeks to understand their tasks.

Next, the quake rescue mice released by Ken will be tested. Although they have only traversed the mock rubble so far, she plans to take her trained rescue rats to earthquake-prone Turkey to see if the rodents can help rescue people trapped under the rubble.

“We haven’t been in a real situation yet; we have a mock site of the wreck,” she explained to Newsweek. “Hopefully it will be implemented, we are partnering with a search and rescue team in Turkey. It will be just a case once there is an earthquake, transportation is arranged.”

If mice are effective in a real earthquake and can navigate real debris, Kane’s program could revolutionize search and rescue techniques.

Twitter d. Donna Kane with one of the “hero mice”.

According to the BBC, people can usually survive anywhere from two to two weeks in the rubble of an earthquake, depending on how much air they have, whether they are injured, and whether they are able to find water. A man in Haiti survived for weeks under the rubble after drinking sewage.

And mice can make the process of rescuing people trapped under rubble easier by locating survivors and notifying first responders on the ground. Kane says it’s work that ferrets seem uniquely suited to do.

“They are very good at surviving in different environments, which just goes to show how good they are for search and rescue work,” she told Newsweek.

So if you’re trapped in the earthquake rubble, it might be the eyes of a rat carrying a backpack — not a dog or a human — that let you know help is on the way.

After reading about “hero” mice being trained to rescue earthquake survivors, watch how scientists have taught mice to drive small cars. Or discover the horrific story of how mice were tortured.

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