Assistant Metro Editor
A conveyor belt that removes M-55 rocket parts from the incinerator’s deactivation furnace and takes them to waste bins jammed and stalled the system’s “mini-burns,” according to Army spokesman Mike Abrams.
Mini-burns are akin to a scrimmage before a game, Abrams said. The mini-burns test the deactivation furnace so that workers burn rockets as though they were performing the agent trial burn.
“It’s an opportunity to test ourselves before being tested by the regulators,”
Abrams said.
Abrams said mini-burns could resume as early as Tuesday night.
For the trials to resume, workers at the Anniston Chemical Disposal Facility had to power down the furnace to cool, fix the belt, then reheat the furnace so data can be collected for the trial, Abrams said.
Since Aug. 9, the Army has been destroying thousands of Cold War-era chemical weapons stored at Anniston Army Depot.
The facility is performing agent trial burns to collect data on the process to destroy the rockets as well as GB nerve agent, or sarin, so federal and state regulators can determine whether the incinerator is as effective and environmentally friendly as the Army says it is.
Workers destroyed 87 M-55 rockets Tuesday, bringing the total to 10,348. No bulk agent collected from the rockets was destroyed Tuesday.