Like mechanised Valkyries, nine helicopters filled with armed men and women in camouflage uniforms swoop over dense forests and remote rivers – but this is not a scene from Apocalypse Now; it is a Brazilian government mission to forestall catastrophe in the Amazon rainforest.
The aircraft from the country’s two main environmental agencies, Ibama and ICMBio, fly for hours above the Tapajós basin, then break formation when they approach their targets: illegal goldmining camps contaminating the waters and earth of the forest.
As the helicopters descend in a cloud of dust, the
