The Army's chemical weapons incinerator will begin a second round of testing on surrogate materials today.These trial burns, expected to last for eight days, will test the facility's deactivation furnace system on materials that are harder to destroy than nerve agent.
The system is designed to burn explosives, fuses, propellant and residual agent after M55 rockets are drained of most of their liquid nerve agent. The system will also burn rockets that can't be drained because their agent has gelled, a controversial procedure that has been criticized by incinerator opponents.
The trial burns will be monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Alabama Department of Environmental Management.
In March, the facility underwent its initial round of testing. Those trial burns focused on the furnace designed to destroy chemical agent. The Army has yet to release a report from the burns.
The Army plans to conduct shakedown testing with nerve agent in September, and agent trial burns in December.
