PROM-1

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

PROM-1 anti-personnel mine.

The PROM-1 is a Yugoslavian manufactured bounding type of anti-personnel mine. It consists of a cylinderical body with a pronged fuze inserted into the top of the mine. It is broadly similar in operation to the German S-mine.

The mine is triggered by the tilting of the prongs situated on top of the mine. This is caused by either direct pressure on the prongs or by tension on a tripwire attached to the prongs. The tilting of the prongs allows three striker retaining balls to escape, releasing the striker, which is driven by a spring into the stab sensitive detonator. The detonator explodes. Some sources report that a one and a half second delay is then initiated before igniting the three gram propellent charge. The explosion of the propellent forces the upper half of the mine body into the air, shearing several brass screws and leaving the base plug of the mine behind in the ground.

The mine's body is tethered to its base by a short length of wire, which unspools behind it as it rises. When the mine reaches a height of approximately 60 centimetres the wire pulls taut. This jerks the detonator assembly, downwards towards onto striker, triggering the main detonator. The main charge then detonates, breaking the internally grooved body into a large number of steel fragments, which spray in all directions. Because the time taken from triggering the mine to detonation is less than one second, there is never any time for people nearby to take cover from the blast.

As with all bounding mines it is lethal at relatively long distances. It is capable of projecting dangerous fragments to range of 100 meters or more, with a lethal range of around 50 meters. The mine will almost certainly seriously injure or kill anyone within 30 meters of the it when triggered.

The PROM-1 can be particularly hard to spot in undergrowth because apart from the prongs, most of it is buried underground and therefore cannot be seen. Although this mine does contain lots of steel (thereby making it easy to detect with a mine-detector) the act of sweeping the detection head over the ground can easily strike the prongs and detonate the mine.

The PROM-1 is difficult to render safe because the fuze becomes unstable after being exposed to weather for several years. Most deminers therefore recommend that this mine is destroyed in situ by detonating an explosive charge next to it.

Usually (though not always) trip-wires around 20 feet (6 meters) in length are fitted to this mine in order to increase its activation area. When tracking trip-wires back to their source, deminers must keep in mind that other landmines may have been planted along its length. It is all too easy to concentrate on following a trip-wire back to its source, forgetting that there could be a PMA-3, a PMA-2 or similar blast mine lying buried underneath.

The mine has been found in Angola, Bosnia, Chile, Croatia, Eritrea, Iraq, Kosovo, Mozambique and Namibia.