Alabama facility has been burning for year without incident

This story was published Sun, Aug 8, 2004

By Jeannine Koranda
Herald Oregon Bureau

An Alabama chemical weapons storage site fired up a chemical weapons incinerator that's virtually identical to the Umatilla Chemical Depot's facility on Aug. 9 last year.

So far, operations at the Anniston Chemical Depot have gone according to plan - no accidents and a record of success that includes a total of 34,361 rockets packed with GB sarin nerve agent destroyed as of Aug. 3. That's about 80 percent of Anniston's GB rocket stockpile.

In spite of the success, the community remains at least partially divided over the Army's weapons destruction program.

"I think everyone kind of breathed a collective sigh of relief" when the first rocket was destroyed, said Sherri Sumners, president of the Calhoun County Chamber of Commerce.

Sumners, who's been involved with the controversy for 10 years, believes the community began returning to normal after the facility started operating.

On the other hand, people like Rufus Kinney, spokesman for Families Concerned About Nerve Gas Incineration, remain uneasy. The group - like its Oregon counterpart GASP - is affiliated with the Chemical Weapons Working Group, a national anti-incineration organization based in Kentucky.

While Kinney is grateful Anniston's first year of operation has passed safely, he thinks there's room for improvement.

"I would say that we don't get regular updates on what they are doing. That bothers me," he said.

Kinney also wants additional monitors installed at the perimeters of the depot with instant alarms. "Unlike most of the sites with incinerators, we have neighborhoods whose back yards are the incinerator fences," he said. "If we have an accident, these people are going to die."

Kinney lives in Jacksonville, about 17 miles northeast of the depot. He feels he's far enough away that his family should be safe, but he tries to avoid going into Anniston - even to the point of driving around it to reach other destinations.

"I never go to Anniston unless I have to," he said. "The only times I've been back in the last year is for events related to the depot."

David Christian, an Anniston architect who opposed incineration, said he and his wife had a hard time deciding to stay. But, he said, "It's my home, I have family here and I have a business here."

While he's pleased with the first year's progress, Christian hesitates to say he's comfortable. "I think it would be less uncomfortable. Comfort is not a word that is in my vocabulary in regards to that process."

He worries that if there is a malfunction, chemical agent can be released from the plant's stack. And he doesn't think emergency preparedness is adequate and that there are enough routes to evacuate the area.

"Nobody knows what is going to happen," he said. "The likelihood that you're going to have 40,000 to 50,000 people do what you are thinking they are going to do is fantasy."

But Eli Henderson, chairman of the Calhoun County Board of Commissioners, believes public safety measures are in place, though he noted local officials had to fight for them.

"One of things we had to argue for was 24-hour manning at our (emergency management) facilities," he said.

Henderson, who represents the area immediately around the depot, said incineration has gone smoothly since startup.

"Nobody called, nobody complained," he said. "I think a lot of it is due to the fact that they are doing a very professional job out there."

He added, "You're not only removing a threat from the community, but a threat from the terrorists."

The community will be safer once the chemical stockpile, especially the sarin, is gone, he said. "Once we get rid of the GB, particularly the rockets, it's all downhill after that."

Henderson worked for 10 years at the Anniston depot as an inspector who went into the storage igloos to inspect the rockets for agent leaks. Any leaking rockets were "overpacked" into larger steel containers and stored in a separate igloo for "leakers."

"I'd like to see some of how they are handling some of the overpacked rockets because I probably handled a bunch of them," he said.

Kenneth Bice, president of Telephone Communications Inc., was at the depot watching on the first day of incineration. "The community is somewhat safer now that they have destroyed what they have, and will be a lot safer when they are done with it," he said.

Bice supported the incineration process enough to form Citizens for Safer Alabama to promote incineration. He believes people have come to accept the process over the past year of operation.

But when the plant started up, it was anything but quiet for the first week.

As president of the chamber of commerce, Sumners did 43 interviews in the first week, including BBC radio live and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

The national attention was unexpected, said Mike Abrams, an Army spokesman at Anniston. He didn't expect his father to read about him in Detroit or his aunt in Pennsylvania to see him quoted.

But he said the concerns have waned and people in the community have told him they are pleased with the facility's success and are more confident. "I think the confidence level has been growing very slowly but surely."

 

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