New Scientist's weekly patent round up is lead by an innovative way to clear mines:

[Ratheon] has developed a shell containing hundreds of steel "arrows" – 155 millimetres long and 15 mm in diameter – that can trigger landmines with a single shot.

Each rod has a flared rear end, like the feathers of an arrow, and hundreds can be packed into a single cylindrical shell. This shell can be lobbed into a mined area and just before impact a charge behind the arrows will fire them downwards. The metal flights will keep the arrows on a straight course so that they pepper the area at high velocity and at regular spaces.

I wouldn't want to be standing under it when it went off, but if it gets rid of mines without adding explosives I'm all for it!