CLEARING THE AIR


the early 1970s. CMA previously had used hydrolysis to destroy nerve agent at its chemical agent destruction facility in Newport, IN, and mustard agent at its destruction facility at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Tis experience provided the greatest lesson on how to deal with the Syrian threat.


Within a month, the team made recom- mendations to the National Defense University and national security staff, and received authorization and funds to start development, with a deadline of six months to achieve an operational system. It would be called the Field Deployable Hydrolysis System (FDHS).


FROM SHORE TO SHIP In July 2013, Syria agreed to surrender its stockpiles of chemical warfare materiel. Other government agencies, including the U.S. State Department, negotiated with European and Middle Eastern countries about where to host the neu- tralization effort. All countries declined to host the FDHS on their land. As a result, FDHS would be housed on a ship operating in international waters.


Beginning in November 2013, crews led by ECBC’s Chemical Biological


DESTROYER


FDHS was successfully installed aboard the MV Cape Ray to destroy some 600 metric tons of Syria’s declared chemical weapons. (DOD photo by C. Todd Lopez)


Application and Risk Reduction Busi- ness Unit fitted the MV Cape Ray, a 650-foot cargo ship of the U.S. Depart- ment of Transportation’s Maritime Administration, with two FDHS units and mobile laboratory facilities, as well as additional living quarters and support facilities. Te ship was also loaded with 220, 6,600-gallon containers that held the reagents used in the disposal process and were used afterward to hold the 1.5 million gallons of waste effluent gener- ated by the hydrolysis process.


With the mission complete, the FDHS team has earned praise from the international CBRN community.


After the team conducted sea trials in Jan- uary 2014, the MV Cape Ray deployed to Rota, Spain, in February, where it remained, awaiting the chemical warfare materiel removed from Syria under the purview of the Organisation for the Pro- hibition of Chemical Weapons.


On July 1, 2014, the MV Cape Ray arrived in Gioia Tauro, Italy, where it took possession of some 600 metric tons of Syrian chemical warfare material removed from Syria aboard the Danish


148


freighter Ark Futura. Once the materiel was transferred aboard the MV Cape Ray, the ship sailed to international waters in the Mediterranean Sea, where the FDHS crew and support personnel conducted round-the-clock destruction operations in 12-hour shifts. (See sidebar on Page 150.) On Aug. 17, 2014, after 42 days of FDHS operations with no serious injuries or incidents, the team completed destruc- tion operations at sea.


CONCLUSION FDHS was created, fabricated and deployed within a year—an exceptional timeline accomplished through DOD’s previous chemical weapons remediation experience, local fabrication and the use of existing equipment. “Te entire process showed the government has the ability to meet urgent needs and tailor acquisition requirements,” said JPM-E’s Brian O’Donnell, director of infrastruc- ture decontamination and recovery.


With the mission complete, the FDHS team has earned praise from the


Army AL&T Magazine April–June 2015


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