In 1998, Puntland, a relatively stable area in the north central region of Somalia, declared itself a semi-autonomous state. In doing this, they essentially stated they wish to remain a part of Somalia while maintaining greater control over their own regional government.
All areas of Somalia have suffered through some sort of armed conflict over the past 40 years, due either to internal or external forces.   The unexploded remnants of these conflicts can be found in all regions of the country.

MAG (Mines Advisory Group) has been operating in the Puntland area since May 2008, clearing much of the area around Garowe of dangerous stockpiled and unexploded ordinance.

In January 2010, GlobalMedic was requested to return and provide the Trauma Care  program to new members of MAG, as the two functioning medics were planning to move full time onto the EOD team.

Ian McLean  returned to Garowe, Somali to teach the program to members of the local police as well as members of the Presidential Guard.  

The necessity for the presence of a medic was reinforced for Ian as he witnessed the EOD team in action destroying just over 300kg of 82 mm mortars. The shells were trucked out to a controlled demolition site well out of town where they were placed in a pit, wired with explosive and destroyed. The blast was witnessed from a bunker over 300 m away from the pit and yet a significant blast wave was still felt. If anything should go wrong during the course of a demolition, the results would be catastrophic.

GlobalMedic’s program objectives have essentially remained the same and again, a first aid refresher course was provided for all members of the EOD team.

The program is designed to focus on injuries that would be expected as a result of some type of explosion, including bleeding control, airway management, spinal immobilization and pain management. Additional information is provided regarding basic field medicine (e.g. recognizing and treating dehydration) and area specific issues (scorpion stings, snakebite etc). Throughout the program basic assessment skills are reinforced and the candidates are exposed to the principles of triage in multi patient scenarios. Given the potential for a catastrophic event, one of the objectives of the first aid program was again to train the EOD team to function as assistants to the medic should an incident occur.
The training was a success and all students progressed through the program with enthusiasm.