Army 'cautiously optimistic' it will move to new phase of Area B cleanup in 3-4 years

Jul. 9—The U.S. Army says it is making progress in addressing groundwater contamination caused by Fort Detrick's Area B, a 399-acre plot of land used in the mid-20th century as a test site for the Army's biological warfare program.

For more than a decade, the Army has been studying the groundwater contamination problems on and around the property between Kemp Lane and Shookstown Road and — more recently — testing technology to treat it.

Joseph Gortva, chief of Fort Detrick's Environmental Management Division, said in an interview Thursday he is "cautiously optimistic" the Army will complete field work at the site within the next two years.

It will likely take another year or two beyond that for officials to finish a report summarizing what they've learned from decades of research on the site. Then, the Army will move to the "feasibility study" phase of the cleanup: evaluating potential methods of addressing the groundwater contamination.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency designates the Area B groundwater as a Superfund site, grouping it with other properties around the country that are contaminated from having hazardous waste dumped, left in the open or otherwise improperly managed.

Because of the site's designation, the Army is federally required to follow certain steps to clean it up. The cleanup process for the site's groundwater has been in the "remedial investigation" phase since 2010.

Under this phase of the process, the Army has collected data to determine the nature of the waste at Area B, assessing the risk the site poses to human health and the environment and testing technology that could be used to clean it up.

When conducting this kind of research, Gortva said, a "loop" can occur, in which scientists gather information, then spot gaps in data they have to address.

But he sees a relatively smooth road ahead for the Army to complete the remedial investigation phase of cleaning up the Area B groundwater.

"I don't see, at this point, that we have any broad-based questions that need to be answered," he said. "They're more focused questions. And when you get into those types of areas of studies, generally, you can answer those data gaps fairly easily."

Community advocate Jen Peppe Hahn has attended Fort Detrick Restoration Advisory Board meetings for about a decade. The committee, which meets quarterly, gives community members the chance to review the progress of Army cleanup activities and participate in decision-making.

Over the years, Peppe Hahn has met people frustrated by how slowly the process seems to be moving.

She is not one of them. Instead, she said she is comforted by the fact the Army is taking time to properly address the contamination. She doesn't want to rush the cleanup effort.

"This is for all the marbles," she said.

Area B history

The origins of Area B date to the late 1940s, when Fort Detrick's Special Operations Group used it to test live and simulated biological warfare materials.

Although a list of live materials tested at the site is not available, according to the EPA, scientists know the simulated materials included the bacteria strains Serratia marcescens, Bacillus atrophaeus and Escherichia coli, commonly known as E. coli.

Test animals were buried in trenches and pits on Area B after being sterilized, according to the EPA's website. So was anthrax and radiological tracer materials, including radioactive carbon, sulfur and phosphorus.

Two cylinders labeled as containing the lethal chemical agent phosphine were reportedly buried at the site, according to the EPA.

After President Richard Nixon ended all nondefensive aspects of the U.S. biological weapons program in 1969, the Army started a decontamination program at Fort Detrick for remaining biological and chemical research materials.

Since then, contaminants including trichloroethene (TCE) and tetrachloroethene (PCE) — chemicals often found in cleaning products — have been detected in the groundwater at and around Area B.

Most drinking water wells near Fort Detrick have been closed. The base provided several homes along Kemp Lane with bottled water until 2016, when properties were connected to city water.

In the early 2000s, the Army dug up a pit on Area B that was a disposal site of chemical waste from Fort Detrick, the National Bureau of Standards and the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

Over the course of three years, the Army unearthed contaminated soil, chemical containers, compressed gas cylinders and laboratory waste in the pit, according to the EPA.

The Washington Post reported on the Army's removal efforts in 2003, one year before they stopped. At the time, the Army had dug up more than 2,000 tons of hazardous waste, including glass vials of live bacteria and nonvirulent anthrax that Fort Detrick officials told the Post the military hadn't known were there.

Officials later implemented a policy preventing any future waste removal from the site. And in 2010, under advice from the EPA, the Army capped the former landfills.

The site's groundwater remains on the EPA's National Priorities List, which guides the federal agency in determining which Superfund sites warrant further investigation.

Studies in progress

After Fort Detrick officials faced years of criticism for not adequately addressing groundwater contamination caused by Area B, Army contractors launched two pilot studies in 2019 to test methods of remediating the contamination.

The ultimate goal of the studies is to reduce the level of contaminants seeping from Area B to Carroll Creek, John Cherry, a representative of the contractor Arcadis, said at a Restoration Advisory Board meeting in 2018.

Contaminants previously found under a former dump site — including chloroform, TCE and PCE — were first detected in the creek's surface water and tributaries in 2012.

The Army regularly monitors contamination levels in the creek, Gortva said Thursday, and they haven't changed dramatically since 2012. Contamination levels remain below federal regulations for drinking and recreation, Gortva said.

Since 2019, one of the two pilot studies has been completed. The results from both will be shared after the final report is done, according to a slide presentation from the June 22 Restoration Advisory Board meeting.

Results from the two pilot studies will inform the Army's efforts to evaluate full-scale remedies for Area B, according to the slide presentation.

The first technology the Army tested in the pilot study was a pump-and-treat method of addressing groundwater contamination.

Over eight and a half months, contractors pumped 3.1 million gallons of groundwater from two sampling points and treated it to remove potential contaminants. They discharged the clean water to a nearby stream.

Later this summer or in the fall, contractors will test a more complicated technology called enhanced reductive dechlorination. They will inject a carbon solution — molasses, for example — into 12 shallow holes to stimulate the microbial breakdown of contaminants in the groundwater.

The Army is expecting a report from the U.S. Geological Survey on Area B later this summer, Gortva said.

Over the past few years, the federal agency has evaluated the Army's studies on groundwater at the site and conducted its own sampling and research.

As part of the agency's work at the site, it has assessed the Army's understanding of where groundwater contamination is located on the site and where it's flowing, Gortva said.

Based on the work the agency has completed, Gortva said, it seems like researchers agree with the Army's conceptual site model, which shows that most groundwater at Area B is flowing into Carroll Creek.

Follow Angela Roberts on Twitter: @24_angier