Australian Defence Force Disposes of Unexploded Ordnance in Nauru

The Aus­tralian Defence Force (ADF) recent­ly sent an Explo­sive Ord­nance Dis­pos­al (EOD) detach­ment to Nau­ru to inves­ti­gate unex­plod­ed ord­nance on the island nation.

The ord­nance, believed to be mate­r­i­al from World War II, was dis­cov­ered at a mine com­plex and posed a threat to the safe­ty of employees. 

The EOD detach­ment was sent as part of Oper­a­tion RENDER SAFE – Defence’s endur­ing oper­a­tion to pro­vide EOD sup­port to South Pacif­ic Island nations for the dis­pos­al of unex­plod­ed ord­nance (UXO).

The detach­ment arrived in Nau­ru ear­li­er this month to eval­u­ate and help safe­ly dis­pose of the material. 

The Chief of Joint Oper­a­tions, Lieu­tenant Gen­er­al Mark Evans, said unex­plod­ed ord­nance is a com­mon prob­lem through­out the South Pacific. 

“Unex­plod­ed ord­nance is a trou­ble­some lega­cy of the Sec­ond World War and has been an ongo­ing prob­lem for the island nations of the South West Pacif­ic,” Lieu­tenant Gen­er­al Evans said. 

“The Aus­tralian Defence Force has iden­ti­fied the dan­gers of UXO and has an ongo­ing com­mit­ment to assist its Pacif­ic neigh­bours with the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and sub­se­quent destruc­tion of this mate­r­i­al so that island com­mu­ni­ties can live safely. 

“Oper­a­tion RENDER SAFE is our response to this threat and ensures we con­tin­ue to pro­vide sup­port through the deploy­ment of trained per­son­nel to deal with this WWII legacy.” 

Media con­tact: Defence Media Liai­son: 02 6127 1999 or 0408 498 664 

Press release
Min­is­te­r­i­al Sup­port and Pub­lic Affairs,
Depart­ment of Defence,
Can­ber­ra, Australia