Aberdeen Completes Chemical Weapons Destruction

Workers on Friday finished disposal of all mustard agent at the Aberdeen Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Maryland, making it the first site on the continental United States to eliminate its entire stockpile of chemical weapons agents, the U.S. Army announced (see GSN, Feb. 7).

“This is a great day for the people of Maryland and for the global chemical weapons disarmament effort,” U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency Director Michael Parker said in a press release.

Workers are continuing to rinse steel storage containers to remove agent residue. That work is expected to be completed next winter, after which the plant’s equipment will be dismantled and decontaminated, according to the Army.

Inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons last week completed a final inspection of Edgewood Chemical Activity’s Chemical Agent Storage Yard. They confirmed that all 1-ton mustard agent containers had been removed from storage for disposal at Aberdeen (U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency release, March 11).

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