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Potential Exposure at Fort McClellan

Potential Exposure at Fort McClellan

From Hill and Ponton

Fort McClellan, AL, served as training and scientific research ground for some of the most volatile chemical, biological, and radiological materials used by the US military. As the US was gearing up to enter WWI, President Woodrow Wilson purchased the property, and it was utilized to train and mobilize troops headed off to the Great War. After the armistice, it served as a demobilization station until 1922 when it began its long history in the training of chemical warfare with the assignment of a Chemical Warfare Service Officer who inspected the installation’s suitability for chemical warfare training and demonstrations. In 1999, the installation was closed due to BRAC legislation. This legislation included a requirement for environmental cleanup before the transfer of the property to public domain status. Almost 100 years after the creation of Fort McClellan, in 2013, an Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) assessment stated that the property is “not expected to result in an increased cancer risk or other harmful health effects in people living in the neighborhoods outside the perimeter of the former PCB manufacturing facility (Monsanto).”

Toxic Exposure

Fort McClellan’s toxic exposure history is long and involved outside industry as well as the US Army’s own chemical, biological, and radiological materials. Starting in the 1920s, Fort McClellan and Anniston, AL, were home to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), mace, tear gas, mustard gas, white phosphorus, Cobalt (Co-60), uranium, plutonium, Cesium (Cs-137) Napalm-B, Agent Orange, nerve and blister agents. Over 600,000 troops were exposed between 1927 and 1999 to an array of toxins through direct exposure in chemical weapons training, or indirect exposure through the air, soil, and water that was polluted by the toxins from the installation and the nearby Monsanto plant.  Monsanto settled a class action lawsuit with the residents of Anniston, AL in 2003, but veterans who lived and trained at the fort were not included in that lawsuit.  Read about additional superfund cleanup sites at Army and Air Force bases in our blog “Is Jet Fuel Another Agent Orange?”

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From Veterans Affairs 

Photo: U.S. Army
Fort McClellan was an Army installation in Alabama that opened in 1917.
Some members of the U.S. Army Chemical Corp School, Army Combat Development Command Chemical/Biological/Radiological Agency, Army Military Police School and Women’s Army Corps, among others, may have been exposed to one or more of several hazardous materials, likely at low levels, during their service at Fort McClellan. Potential exposures could have included, but are not limited to, the following:
  • Radioactive compounds (cesium-137 and cobalt-60) used in decontamination training activities in isolated locations on base.
  • Chemical warfare agents (mustard gas and nerve agents) used in decontamination testing activities in isolated locations on base.
  • Airborne polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) from the Monsanto plant in the neighboring town.
Although exposures to high levels of these compounds have been shown to cause a variety of adverse health effects in humans and laboratory animals, there is no evidence of exposures of this magnitude having occurred at Fort McClellan.

PCBs and the Monsanto chemical plant

From 1929 to 1971, an off-post Monsanto chemical plant operated south of Fort McClellan in Anniston. PCBs from the plant entered into the environment, and the surrounding community was exposed.
Since the 1990s, several investigations have been conducted to characterize the exposure of Anniston residents to PCBs from the Monsanto plant. In 2015, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) published an assessment of the potential health risks caused by airborne PCBs in Anniston and concluded that the concentrations found were “not expected to result in an increased cancer risk or other harmful health effects in people living in the neighborhoods outside the perimeter of the former PCB manufacturing facility.”

Fort McClellan today

Fort McClellan closed in 1999 as part of the Army Base Closure and Realignment Committee (BRAC) program. The BRAC legislation required the environmental cleanup of Fort McClellan prior to its transfer to the public domain. Oversight of parts of the base have since been transferred to the Alabama Army National Guard, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Justice, and the Department of the Interior, as well as to the community of Anniston, where the re-development and re-use of the land is overseen by the McClellan Development Authority.

Veteran health care and compensation benefits

Veterans who are experiencing health issues that they associate with their service while at Fort McClellan should see their primary care provider or contact their local Environmental Health Coordinator.
Veterans may also file a claim for disability compensation. VA decides these claims on a case-by-case basis.

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