by Alex Gerard, Rhoko Manager
Living in the rainforest always throws challenges your way and in my first 4 months there have been plenty of those! Today was one of the more alarming. Having had a relatively uneventful first hour I walked back into camp to find what appeared to be steam coming off our solar shed’s roof. Since it had just rained and the sun was attempting an appearance I thought that I was witnessing a rather atmospheric event of evaporation and called Sylvain to enjoy it with me (you sometimes take any entertainment you can get!). I soon started to smell a very worrying scent, that of burning plastic! We quickly moved inside the shed where it was obvious that we were very close to a fire as the cables that supply our main shed with light and power for our radio had completely melted and there were sparks flying everywhere. I quickly unwired the dangerous wires, I know what a hero!
and then started to investigate the mess that was left.

Alex fixing the solar power
We are often battling against the environment out here, sometimes the weather and sometimes rodents! The start of the damage to the wiring appeared to be from a mouse. You’d think that with all that the rainforest can offer, plastic and wire would be way down the menu! Unfortunately the damage had extended outside of the hut and this meant a complete rewire.
All of our cabling is buried underground, so I had to pull everything up and assess the bigger picture. Like with all jobs, there was more damage to find! Having followed the cables up to the kitchen, where they go under the floor, I found that my furry nemesis had been busy! Not only had he (or she) been chowing down on the supply for the radio under the flooring, it had made the lighting cable it’s desert! This meant I had to remove ALL the wiring to the main shed. We do not have much of the heavy duty cable needed at camp, so I had to use what I could to safely wire up to and inside the hut, then attach to the remaining uneaten cable.

The Solar shed
As I mentioned earlier and as anyone who does DIY will know, such jobs always lead to more jobs! The radio in the security shed is also fed by the solar shed and it quickly became apparent the Danger Mouse (British reference to one of the best cartoons of the 80’s!) had been slowly destroying our communications! (This could be part of a bigger plot, so be warned!) This meant that my day of wiring was not over and as the light in camp faded I was left to continue with my trusty headlamp, though compared with the rest of the days electrics, this was quite straight forward.
I was certainly an eventful day and I now know that we must all be vigilant as we don’t know when DM will strike again! It also highlights how important out solar shed is. It is the only way we have of charging out portable radios for patrol, security etc. It runs our radio for communicating to Calabar and the outside world. It gives us light for the evenings and powers our laptops for research and for writing these blogs!






My name is Claire Coulson, I am the Director of CERCOPAN and have worked for the organisation since January 2007. I spend my time between Calabar HQ and Rhoko our bush site.

























