- FREDERICK, Md. -- Workers
excavating a water-polluting dump at Fort Detrick found two sealed glass
vials containing live bacteria that might have come from an infectious
disease research laboratory, the Army said Friday
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- The granular, whitish-brown material is not anthrax and
is not among the agents recognized as biological weapons, Lt. Col. Donald
Archibald, the post's environmental officer, said.
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- It could have come from Detrick labs that develop vaccines
and other defenses against infectious diseases troops might encounter in
the field, or from other government agencies, including the National Cancer
Institute, that are tenants on the post, officials said.
-
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- Scientists at Detrick's U.S. Army Medical Institute of
Infectious Diseases should be able to identify the organism by late next
week, Detrick spokeswoman Eileen Mitchell said.
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- Regardless of the vials' source, the Jan. 7 discovery
and the Army's delay in disclosing its preliminary findings angered Gerald
P. Toomey, the civilian co-chairman of a community advisory board created
to help guide the cleanup of Detrick landfills blamed for leaking cancer-causing
industrial solvents into the area's ground water.
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- "On many occasions, we had brought up the subject,
and they assured us there was no historical data that anything of that
type had been disposed of in these pits," Toomey said.
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- Army officials had previously said that all biological
refuse was either incinerated or sterilized before disposal. On Friday,
they said there was a low probability of finding biological agents.
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- Toomey said the Army reported last week, in e-mailed
daily excavation updates, that it had found some vials Jan. 7 but it didn't
tell him about the bacteria until Thursday night.
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- "We were always concerned, and this certainly doesn't
strengthen our faith in them," Toomey said.
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- Archibald said it took time to rule out anthrax, which
Fort Detrick produced in large quantities under an offensive biological
weapons program from 1951 to 1969, when President Richard Nixon banned
such work. The landfill was in use in the 1960s and '70s, Mitchell said.
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- The containers were the first intact vials found in the
landfill since the $17 million excavation began in November, Archibald
said. Safety-suited workers also found five mouse embryos in glass bottles,
some syringes, and some broken glass in the same area, he said.
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- He said the work by contractor IT Corp. has been halted
until the bacteria are identified and additional safety measures are implemented.
The excavation site is covered with a stadium-sized tent and shielded underground
with an earth-freezing system that is supposed to prevent leaks.
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- John Verrico, a spokesman for the Maryland Department
of the Environment, which is monitoring the cleanup, said his agency is
satisfied with the safeguards.
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- "We believe that the measures are very protective
and we don't see any additional concern because of what they found, either
for the environment or the workers," he said.
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