Anniston Star
August 6, 2002

Stick to the program

In our opinion

Over the past couple of weeks, we have learned more of the details of the Army's plans to change the schedule for destruction of the chemical weapons stockpile at the Anniston Army Depot.

The more we learn about it, the less we like it.

Among other shortcomings, the new plan calls for a delay in the destruction of VX rockets, a move the Army admits will result in a slight increase in the risk to the community. That in itself should be reason enough to back off the plan. But in light of a recent risk analysis of the stockpile, it appears that a bad idea has turned into an atrocious idea.

The new analysis concludes that VX rockets are an even greater risk than previously thought. In the past, the Army believed the greatest risk was a lightning strike to igloos containing sarin gas stored at the Depot. Now authorities believe the greater risk is a lightning strike to the igloos containing VX.

If that is not enough to convince you this is a bad idea then listen to Steve Bunk, safety chief for the program manager for Chemical Demilita-rization, when he speaks about the possibility of a lightning strike at the Depot:

"If you look at the numbers, it says we already should have had a fire out at Anniston. Which tells me that either we've had good luck or the science has flaws in it. That's how high the probability comes out to be."

Yes, the science may be flawed. But wouldn't it be safer to go back to the original plan, the plan that everyone at the Depot had been operating under for years, the one that called for quicker destruction of the VX rockets?

The argument for sticking to that original plan gains even more strength when you consider the objections that Preston Gray, the former top Westinghouse employee at the Depot, has with the new proposal.

Gray, who is a candidate for state senate, knows the incinerator project inside and out having worked as a contractor on the project and says his problem is mostly with changing the plans so late in the game.

While he continues to support the incineration of the stockpile strongly, he thinks this new plan is a mistake.

So do we. And we highly suspect a lot of scientists would agree.

The question is why would the Army want to change the plan so close to the startup date and why would it do this knowing the move represents an increase, albeit a slight one, in the risk to the community?

There is an obsession in Washington in getting rid of the nation's chemical agent stockpiles as quickly as possible. That's not a bad way to be really, as long as it is balanced with safety. The problem comes in when you deviate from that, as the Army seems to be doing now.

But a slight statistical increase in risk, apparently, is being outweighed by this obsession and a desire by some to show the administration and the public that the Army is moving forward with destruction in a rapid manner. That'll play good with people who don't look closely at the numbers and don't understand the nuances of the issue. The value, in other words, of public relations both internally and nation-wide for the administration and the Army, cannot be discounted.

Of course, we aren't interested in public relations; we are only interested in the rapid, safe
destruction of the stockpile.

Finally, the Army tells us that the payoff will be that the entire stockpile will be destroyed from six to nine months sooner. That's great, but aren't we primarily talking about ridding ourselves of the blister agent sooner, the last chemicals to be dealt with, the material that poses the least danger to the community?

Don't get us wrong. The sooner we get rid of the stockpile the better off we will all be, and
incineration presents the best way forward for that. But safety is paramount and obviously the best thing to do is to stick to a plan that has been in place for years rather than to shift to a riskier one at the last minute.