Tuesday, November 15th, 2005
Department of National Defence assessing risk of old Pacific Ocean dump site

VANCOUVER (CP) - Mustard gas and phosgene, two of mankind's nastiest chemical warfare agents, were dumped off the west coast of Vancouver Island after the Second World War, says an environmental engineer assessing the current risk.

The West Coast dump site, as well as two others off the East Coast, are being examined under the country's Warfare Agent Disposal Project, said Judith Bennett, an environmental engineer for the Department of National Defence.

The project was launched a couple of years ago and the West Coast dump site was revealed through an historical review of military archives, she said Tuesday.

The research showed that ammunition and chemical warfare agents were taken across Canada by train, shipped out about 160 kilometres west of Vancouver Island and dumped in about 2,500 metres of water.

How much was dumped is not yet known, she said, but the agents included mustard gas and phosgene.

Mustard gas, also known as yperite, was first used by the German army in 1917 and was the most lethal of all poisonous chemicals used during the war.

Phosgene was used extensively during the First World War as a choking agent and was responsible for many deaths. It is used in industry to produce other chemicals such as pesticides.

"Warfare agents could have been either in canister form or weaponized when they were dumped," said Bennett.

The weaponized form means the chemicals would be enclosed in a device that if detonated, would explode and disperse the chemicals, she said.

Bennett, who is a project officer for the disposal project, said the Defence Department is doing a "risk assessment" to determine what the risk is to human health.

When that is completed a decision will be made to try to pinpoint the precise site of the dumping. The project must also decide whether to examine the site at the bottom of the ocean, as well as decide whether to leave the canisters or retrieve them.

"The first thing is a risk assessment based on science to pinpoint the site," she said.

The same assessment is being done at the two Atlantic dump sites - one off Sable Island. The other involves a Canadian ship that contained chemical warfare agents but was sunk by a German U-boat.

The director of a U.S.-based watchdog agency said the issue of chemical dumping is one where "there are a whole lot more questions than answers."

Craig Williams, director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group in Berea, Ky., said Congress recently asked for an investigation into chemical agent dumping in the U.S..

"It's a real concern," he said.

Now, the U.S. has two methods to dispose of chemical agents, incineration or by mixing them with other chemicals to neutralize them, he said.