Tooele Transcript Bulletin
August 26, 2003

Ammo disposal evolves at depot

by Michael Rigert
Staff Writer

It’s widely known that one of Tooele Army Depot’s primary missions is to supply U.S. troops with ordnance and ammunition when they’re sent into harm’s way. For example, a critical percentage of the bullets, bombs and explosive devices used in Operation Iraqi Freedom was supplied from the depot. However, one vital component of the depot’s ammunitions operation often overlooked by the public is the safe and reliable demilitarization and deactivation of munitions which are defective, in over supply or simply past their prime.

On Tuesday, Aug. 19 the Tooele Transcript-Bulletin was invited to the depot to witness an open detonation, the destruction of ammunition in a series of pits in a remote box canyon.
Ron Snyder, a supply management specialist with ammo operations, said though the depot regularly schedules open detonations between the months of March and October, demilitarization changes in recent years have significantly enhanced the environmental standards while reducing the size of the blasts. In the past, some Grantsville residents have filed complaints that the detonations caused disturbances and even damage to their homes.
However, since the depot self-imposed a 750-pound net explosive weight on munitions being destroyed, Snyder said calls from residents have all but disappeared.

“We haven’t had any local complaints at all this year,” he said.

Craig Powers, a production controller, monitors local weather patterns, which must be within specific parameters for him to OK a detonation which are typically scheduled four days a week. Variable factors include wind speed, precipitation, visibility and cloud cover and ceiling. If everything checks out, Powers clears the range for the detonation. He even notifies federal, state and county authorities and reports the chemical breakdown of the emissions caused by each blast.

“I have 30 minutes in the morning to decide whether it’s a go or not,” Powers said.
Each day his office updates a web site located at www.tead.army.mil/obod.htm, which details the weather parameters for detonations and indicates to the public whether or not a scheduled blast is a “go” or a “no go.”

On this particular day, detonation crews prepared loaded M577 fuzes placed into the 14 pits and used TNT and mines as the explosive charges. Employees said though each worker specializes in various elements of demilitarization of the ordnance, they are thoroughly cross-trained on all detonation procedures. Prepping the pits, explosives and target ammunition begins early in the day at 6:45 a.m. and runs right up until the 2 p.m. detonation.

From the safety of an armor-plated shack high above the pit, the detonation supervisors fire the charges in two-minute intervals resulting in a sight, sound and shake, which rivals any
Fourth of July pyrotechnics.

Kathy Anderson, the depot’s public affairs and protocol officer, said sometimes residents call about the billowing blast plumes with concerns about debris.

“When people call about the mushroom cloud, I explain it’s all dirt and sand,” she said.

The munitions and explosives in the 10-foot pits are covered with several layers of dirt and sand to muffle the sound of the blasts.

Snyder and Anderson said net explosive weights for the detonations have significantly decreased over the years from 3,000 to 1,000 and now 750 pounds. There’s even records from the 1950s of detonations of 5,000 pounds of ammunition.

“Since we’ve increased the pits and decreased the tonnage to 750 pounds, complaints have been virtually non-existent,” Snyder said.

However, he also re-emphasized that with new and emerging technologies and processes, the depot only detonates munitions that it can’t recycle or are too large to be eliminated in
the base’s deactivation furnace.

“We’re just trying to detonate things that we can’t do any other way,” Snyder said.

For instance, Snyder said the depot has begun partnering with several private firms in the demilitarization, disposal and recycling of ammunition materials for the mutual benefit of those involved. He said the technological advances are making the disposal of ammunition so much more effective and at the same time safe for the environment, that somewhere down the road traditional methods may become a thing of the past.

“We’re always looking for new technologies to keep reducing the need for detonations,” Snyder said.

The depot terms the new “gee whiz” technologies and processes R3 — resource, recovery and recycling.

The small arms demil facility, one of the newer additions to the depot, uses an environmentally friendly process called denitrification, by which the projectiles, propellants and primer in 20mm and .50 rounds (among others) are removed and eliminated leaving a clean brass casing that can be resold as scrap metal.

Chuck Holland, a demil technician, said instead of deactivating just 8,900 rounds per day in the furnace, the $400,000 small arms machine produced by General Motors can process and recycle nearly 20,000 rounds per shift.

“It’s doubled our production and recycling,” Holland said.

He added that a special air filter on the state-certified device means zero emissions are emitted.

Darwin Jones, the ammunition demil supervisor, added that the depot and private industry are currently working on methods to recycle the propellants removed from the bullets to be used either as fertilizer or to be reconverted for use in mining industry explosives.

Snyder said the small arms demil facility has already processed 350,000 rounds since it opened for full-time production several months ago, and nearly 1.2 million rounds are scheduled to be disposed of in 2004.

Larger munitions and the residual components processed in the small arms facility are eliminated in the depot’s 1,600 degree Fahrenheit deactivation furnace. Materials put in the computer-operated furnace go through a series of processes including a cyclone kiln, an afterburner, 100 feet of heat dissipation ducts, a duct filter housing and a smoke stack.
Jones and Holland said each stage of the furnace further reduces the materials being destroyed (down to the dust residue) to prevent any harmful emissions from entering the atmosphere. Ordnance explodes inside the cyclone kiln, which is constructed of steel armor plate which is several inches thick. Holland said even the dust is considered a hazardous waste. To maintain the highest environmental standards computerized systems also monitor the final CO2 emissions.

“If at any time it exceeds the limits, it automatically shuts down,” Holland explained.

The discharge scrap is collected in barrels and further analyzed for contaminants before being shipped from the depot.

“We’re hoping to capture 100 percent of the fugitive emissions by continuing to upgrade the furnace and build upon our successes,” Jones said.

The depot has reason to be proud of the furnace because, as Holland explained, the Tooele depot’s burner is one of the dozen or so similar facilities around the world in places like Egypt, Korea, Japan, Taiwan and others located in the United States.

Of them all, Holland said, “this furnace is the most productive out of any one system.”

Finally the group toured a facility utilizing a technology process called hydrolysis currently being pioneered at the depot in a partnership with the private firm General Atomics. Now in its second phase of testing, a chemical called sodium hydroxide is used to neutralize explosive devices without the need for incinerators or detonations. The depot is currently testing the demil process on small explosives called CADs and PADs (Cartridge Actuated Devices, Propellant Actuated Device), small explosives used by the military to, for example, to pop the canopy off a jet fighter during an emergency pilot ejection.

“We have 50 to 60 igloos full of them,” Jones said.

Louie Wong, an engineer working on the project, said hydrolysis works by heating the sodium hydroxide to 100 degrees Celsius in a machine that looks like a vertical stainless steel washing machine. It can be operated around the clock.

“It’s takes about an hour to an hour-and-a-half for the process to completely dissolve the ammo to non-explosives,” he said.

In addition the system includes a device which “scrubs” and purifies the residual gases so that only clean air is released into the environment.

The hope is with appropriate funding the hydrolysis system will be used at Tooele Army
Depot in addition to facilities at Pueblo, Colo., and Bluegrass, Ky.

“We’ve proved it works,” Snyder said. “We’re not too far from production.”