Hermiston Herald
August 27, 2002

Technician mistakenly walks off with sarin

HERMISTON - A lab technician at the Umatilla Chemical Agent Disposal
Facility (UMCDF) mistakenly took home a mini, sealed glass vial with 24
drops of rubbing alcohol and GB (sarin) solution Friday afternoon.

The alcohol solution was a laboratory standard used to calibrate the
facility's agent air-monitoring equipment. The technician was performing
routine testing of the equipment, which will be used when chemical warfare
agent disposal operations begin.

The technician left work at about 3 p.m. and discovered the vial in a pants
pocket shortly after arriving home and immediately returned to the depot. At
about the same time, UMCDF lab workers using the UMCDF established
accountability system discovered the vial was missing. It was returned to
the lab at about 5 p.m.

The GB concentration in the solution is at 29.3 parts per billion and does
not pose a health risk. Using previous information provided by the Oregon
Department of Environmental Quality, the concentration rate is equivalent to
29 seconds in 928 years.

"While the solution posed no danger to the employee, surrounding communities
or the environment, the Army takes an incident such as this seriously," said
Don Barclay, the Army's UMCDF site project manager. "Therefore, an
investigation started immediately and any necessary corrective actions will
be made to help ensure this type of incident does not occur again."

The depot's operations center notified off-post emergency operations centers
in Umatilla and Morrow counties, Benton County, Wash., and the states of
Oregon and Washington. The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian
Reservation were also notified.