USA Today
August 18, 2003

Alabamians fear chemical disaster

By Larry Copeland, USA TODAY

ANNISTON, Ala. — Fear and distrust run deep here in "the pink zone."

These are the neighborhoods closest to the Anniston Army Depot, where the Army began burning obsolete but deadly chemical weapons this month. Toxins such as sarin and VX nerve gas — the very weapons of mass destruction that have been so much in the news lately — will be destroyed at the depot over the next seven years.

If an accident occurred that sent a toxic cloud into the air, the pink zone would be Ground Zero.

In an eerie preview of what life might be like in a future chemical attack by terrorists, people who live within 6 miles of the incinerator have been issued protective plastic hoods, portable air filters, duct tape and plastic and told to prepare a "safe room" in their homes.

Anniston is the first American city where citizens have been issued gas masks by the government. For months, people have been urged to learn how to use them. And they've been told that if a chemical leak occurs, don't flee; instead, "shelter in place" in their homes, schools or businesses.

Safe rooms are being created in schools, jails and hospitals in the pink zone. The government is spending $55 million to retrofit buildings where the public gathers with refrigerator-size air-filtration systems, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. A total of $140 million is being spent on Anniston's preparedness.

But that brings little comfort in the pink zone. Randy Hayes, 51, senior pastor of Church on the Rock, says the preparations are "just to appease people, so there's not widespread panic."

Many take it as a given that there will be an accident at the incinerator, where the Army will destroy 4.5 million pounds of rockets containing sarin, VX and nerve agents. (These are among chemicals the U.S. government said were being produced by Saddam Hussein and could be used by terrorists.)

People here say they know what it's like to feel betrayed.

Like thousands of others, Hayes is a plaintiff in one of several class-action lawsuits against a former Monsanto chemical plant.

The lawsuits accuse the company of contaminating west Anniston for decades with polychlorinated biphenyls — or PCBs — which probably cause cancer. PCBs are also linked to low birth weight and learning disabilities. Monsanto had no connection to the Army's incinerator.

In the pink zone, families have been decimated.

Uncles and aunts die early from cancer. Babies are born with major organs outside their bodies. Children struggle with mysterious mood swings and the inability to learn.

It didn't help that two days after starting to burn the weapons, the Army said last Monday it was shutting down for a day because of mechanical problems. The incinerator shut down again Tuesday but was operating Wednesday.

'Absolute madness'

Rufus Kinney, a Jacksonville State University English teacher, was the lone protester outside the gates when the incinerator was fired up Aug. 9.

"The irony is that our government is looking for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and at the same time, they're not protecting us from our own weapons of mass destruction," he says. "This is absolute madness. I call it crazy in Alabama taken to a new level."

The Calhoun County Emergency Management Agency has distributed more than 17,000 gas masks, almost 12,000 portable air-filtration units and almost 14,000 shelter-in-place kits. The Army says it is highly unlikely that any of it will ever be needed.

Michael Abrams, an incinerator spokesman, says burning the chemicals is a safe method of disposal. Since 1990, he says, the Army has burned 16,214,000 pounds of chemical agents at two other facilities — Deseret Chemical Depot in Tooele, Utah and Johnston Atoll in the Pacific Ocean southwest of Hawaii.

Abrams acknowledges that those facilities are in remote locations: a sparsely populated area and the ocean. He says there were "only two or three" occurrences of any chemical agent escaping. Opponents argue incineration has never been used in a populated area. They say "neutralization," another means of chemical weapons destruction used elsewhere in the nation, is less risky. Decades ago, when the decision was made to destroy Anniston's chemical weapons, "there was not a neutralization technology that handled (sarin), VX, mustard, explosives and contaminated metal parts," Abrams says.

Chanting, "No more burning, no more lies, better way, neutralize," about 65 people marched Saturday to protest the incinerator's start-up. The Anniston facility contains about 7% of the nation's approximately 31,000 tons of stockpiled chemical weapons. Those arms are being destroyed to comply with an international treaty to neutralize the weapons by 2007. More than 660,000 chemical weapons are stored here in concrete bunkers known as "igloos." The Cold War relics were quietly brought here during the 1960s.

Some local political leaders support the Army's plan. Anniston Mayor Chip Howell and six other Calhoun County mayors pushed for the incineration to start. "I'm as comfortable as I can be," he says.

Worried about 'the plume'

In Anniston and the cities and towns nearby, people talk a lot about "the plume" — an accidentally released toxic cloud — and how fast it might move over their homes and schools. The mood hovers between paranoia and imminent panic, giving the city the pending doom feel of an old Twilight Zone episode.

Rumors and speculation are rampant. "People here feel hopeless," says the Rev. Nimrod Reynolds, senior pastor of 17th Street Missionary Baptist Church.

Brenda Lindell is concerned and she doesn't even live in the pink zone. Her home in east Anniston is in a nearby area where the residents were given air-filtration units and shelter-in-place kits.

Lindell, a founder of Families Concerned about Nerve Gas Incineration, fought the project for more than a decade.

"You think that's going to keep me safe?" she says, poking through the box containing her kit. "I don't think so."

Contributing: Associated Press