Washington DC’s congressional representative Eleanor Holmes Norton(D) and Representative Constance Morella (D-Maryland) have requested a General Accounting Office investigation into the Army’s cleanup of buried chemical munitions in the nation’s capital. Buried weapons dating back to World War I, some of which contain chemical agent, were discovered nine years ago in the upscale Spring Valley neighborhood near the campus of American University. The lawmakers announced their plans at a House Government Reform Committee hearing in July 2001 on chemical weapons-related arsenic contamination in Washington, DC. The requested inquiry would include not only the Spring Valley neighborhood (shown in figure 2), but also parts of Catholic University, the University of the District of Columbia, and the Washington Naval Yard. Covering less than 70 square miles, Washington, DC ranks tenth on a list of sites nationwide with potentially buried munitions.

Three years after American University had officially opened its doors, the US government leased some 660 acres of land from the university in 1917 for weapons research and testing. The 1,200 chemists and engineers on staff at the American University Experiment Station would eventually work with nearly fifty different poisonous gases, including mustard gas and lewisite. At the conclusion of the war, most of the weapons were shipped to Edgewood Arsenal in Aberdeen, Maryland. However, as was customary at the time, unusable ordnance were buried and forgotten.

Forgotten, that is, until January 1993, when a construction worker digging a utility trench uncovered a buried artillery round. The Army’s Technical Escort Unit was immediately called to conduct an emergency removal operation. Over 140 munitions were excavated, 43 of which were later found to contain chemical agent. Several weeks later the Army Corps of Engineers took over the second phase of Operation Safe Removal during which investigators took soil samples from nearly a quarter of the area’s properties. Subsequent analysis determined that the area contained no major health hazards warranting further remedial action and the area received a clean bill of health in June 1995.

However, in February 1998, the Army reopened the investigation after realizing that a previous dig for a large bomb burial pit was off-target by approximately 150 feet. The location of the bomb graveyard actually fell in the garden of the South Korean ambassador’s residence, necessitating additional excavation and testing. Digging began in March 1999 and yielded some 620 items, including pieces of bombs, leaking artillery rounds, and contaminated waste. Ultimately, the top four feet of soil were removed from the property. In addition, the excavation also found that soil in the area had elevated arsenic levels well above Environmental Protection Agency-accepted thresholds. By January 2001, the search for chemical material expanded to other parts of the American University campus, including a day-care center.

Even though arsenic occurs naturally, area officials concluded that the high readings in Spring Valley were attributable to the development of lewisite, a World War I-era blister agent that contains arsenic. Arsenic levels in the ambassador’s yard were as high as 1,000 parts per million; levels at the university child care facility topped out at 498 parts per million. The normal local range for arsenic presence in soil is between 3 and 18 parts per million, with an average of around 5 parts per million. The Environmental Protection Agency recommends soil removal if levels exceed 43 parts per million.

In 1999, the Agency for Toxic Diseases and Substances Registry listed arsenic as the most hazardous substance, beating out other poisonous entries such as lead, mercury, and benzene. The element has also been cited as a carcinogen, although experts note that the cancer risk comes from extended exposure to high arsenic levels rather than passing contact. Students and university employees who had regular contact with contaminated soil were offered arsenic tests in early 2001. The Army also expanded soil tests in May 2001 to include 1,200 residential and 400 nonresidential properties in the Spring Valley area. Army officials anticipated that sampling would conclude by the end of the year.