Imagine living in a city that is still littered with bombs from about 80 years ago – and then one exploding.
The scars of war cover Maeverlyn Pitanoe’s body. The 50-year-old mother-of-two was blown up while at a Mother’s Day fundraising barbecue in Solomon Islands last year by an unexploded World War Two bomb.“I was standing right on the bomb. I didn’t hear the blast but I heard this hissing sound. [Then] I was going backwards … next thing, I was on the ground,” she recalls, looking at her shattered body.“I saw two fingers hanging, one was already gone ... I just prayed, ‘God help me.
Thousands of rounds of ammunition and bombs were fired and dropped into the rolling hills of the now-bustling city, some with an estimated failure rate of one-in-three, leaving potentially thousands of unexploded rounds in the ground. The family of Raziv Hilly and Charles Noda who were killed on Mother's Day 2021, with Rusilla Posala , Billy Buka and survivor Maerverlyn Pitanoe .
Ms Pitanoe was not expected to survive, but after 53 days in hospital was discharged. Her life has since changed dramatically.
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