Umatilla Chemical Depot site manager leaving project

This story was published Fri, Mar 31, 2000

By Terry Hudson
Herald Oregon bureau

HERMISTON - As the Umatilla chemical weapons incinerator nears 80 percent completion, the man ultimately responsible for the plant's construction is leaving the project.

Raj Malhotra, who has been the site project manager for the Army, has been reassigned to the Program Manager for Chemical Demilitarization headquarters in Edgewood, Md.

Malhotra has had the same job on the Umatilla project for four years.

"I'm sad in the sense that this is my baby," Malhotra said. "I've developed excellent friendships with people and the local community, and I will miss that part. But we're going back home. I have family in New Jersey and New York and being close to them played a key factor."

Malhotra's new duties will focus on special projects for the program manager's office.

The Umatilla incinerator is one of several across the country that will destroy the nation's stockpile of chemical weapons.

The Umatilla Chemical Depot, seven miles west of Hermiston, stores 220,604 munitions and containers filled with 7.4 million pounds of deadly nerve and mustard agents. The Army plans to begin burning the weapons in the incinerator in early 2002.

The commander at the Umatilla Chemical Depot, Lt. Col. Tom Woloszyn, has worked closely with Malhotra since the commander arrived eight months ago.

"We had a great working relationship," Woloszyn said. "The site manager there has got to work hand in hand with the depot commander, and we worked together daily. The good news is he's going to a key position, and he's going to be a great asset to the organization.

"I'm disappointed to lose him, but this is a really great move for him. The working relationship we've developed over the last eight months will take time to build up again. It's very important that the continuity go on with the plant and the whole program."

Malhotra will start his new job May 1. He plans to stay at the Umatilla Chemical Depot until late April.

No schedule has been announced for selecting a permanent replacement for Malhotra, but Stephen DePew, currently the site project manager for the Anniston, Ala., facility, will serve as the temporary acting site project manager here.

DePew is expected to return to Anniston once a selection has been made for the permanent Oregon project manager.

In Hermiston, Malhotra became a familiar sight at public meetings, where he gave updates on the construction project and answered technical questions.

"The community has to know what we're doing, and my agency is open to everybody," Malhotra said Thursday. "We need feedback all the time. We have the technical expertise, but we want to keep the public informed on the progress we're making at the site."

Malhotra said some of the most trying times in his stint here were the weeks that followed a Sept. 15 incident in which 36 workers were sickened and sent to the hospital after breathing some mysterious noxious vapors inside a munitions building.

Extensive studies still have not determined what happened that day.

"There was a lot of frustration," Malhotra said. "We learned something in how we should have addressed it. We are very safety conscious. We do what needs to be done, and we continue making progress at the project."

Once incinerator construction is finished, the facility will move forward with testing.

"I've enjoyed working here," Malhotra said. "The people are so friendly and I have received excellent support from the community. There is a strong work ethic in this area and that shows in the quality of the construction at the project.

"This is an excellent project here. We have a vision that we will one day be done with all chemical munitions. Then we can sit back and say we've disposed of all the chemical weapons."

 

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