Redstone Arsenal is receiving its first permanent system for destroying recovered ordnance, a prototype facility designed to process munitions safely and at a rate that could keep long-term cleanup moving forward, minimize potential delays, and speed the clearing of munitions on the installation, thanks to the Engineering and Support Center, Huntsville.
Known as the Prototype Recovered Ordnance Destruction System, the facility will integrate a static detonation chamber with an off-gas treatment system. Project documents prepared for the Army describe a system that will thermally destroy recovered munitions and related materials in a contained chamber, leaving scrap metal for disposal or recycling.
Redstone officials have previously relied on smaller, portable disposal units that could process only limited quantities at a time. The permanent system is intended to match the pace of ordnance excavation, reducing the risk that recovered munitions could accumulate in storage and force excavation to halt, speeding operations by a potential 75% over current available disposal methods…