Weldon Spring Ordnance Works | News | St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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Weldon Spring Ordnance Works

Date: 2/17/2012 Album ID: 1417356

During World War II the Weldon Spring Ordnance Works in St. Charles County employed more than 5,000 people and produced more than 700 hundred million tons of TNT. After the war, a uranium processing plant was built and "yellow cake" was produced. Waste from both operations were stored in open-air pools. Later, the plant produced toxic herbicides. This has led to a legacy of illness and claims against the government. In 1985 clean up of site began, and in 2001 about 1.5 million cubic yards of waste was buried, effectively cleaning up the site. Currently, a museum sites nearby telling the history of the site. The land surrounding the area is now a conservation area.

Traffic backs up on westbound Highway 40 approaching the Daniel Boone bridge on Dec. 8, 1941. The Army posted guards at the bridge approaches, and spot checks slowed the flow of cars and trucks. Many of these drivers are headed to work at the government explosives plant at Weldon Spring, across the river in St. Charles County. (Post-Dispatch)

A small no trespassing sign is all that marks the perimeter of the Weldon Spring ordnance plant cleanup site Wednesday, July 31, 2002, in Weldon Spring, Mo. The U.S. Department of Energy has announced that the cleanup phase of the project is officially complete. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

4/12/06 Wednesday Weldon Springs
Francis Howell High School seniors Rachel Fauser, left, and Katie Berlin jog Wednesday afternoon on the newly dedicated Hamburg Trail past the Weldon Springs disposal site shortly after a ribbon cutting ceremony officially opened the trail. Students from the high school have been using a portion of the trail to train for various sports.
PHOTO BY J.B. FORBES

Monday, August 5, 2002 - Visitors climb to the top of the Disposal Cell Monday at the Department of Energy's Weldon Spring Site Remedial Action Project. A new interpretive center was dedicated Monday as a sort of museum, recording the history of the site back to World War II when the U.S. Army forced the evacuation of three small towns to build a munitions plant. The area later was used by the Atomic Energy Commission, the Energy Department's predecessor, for a uranium processing plant. The nuclear waste from the project in buried in the mound.
PHOTO BY JERRY NAUNHEIM JR./POST-DISPATCH

THURSDAY (6/6/02) Nick Boss, an engineer, checks over plans for the Weldon Spring Site Interpretative Center that will open to the public next month at 7295 Highway 94 South. The cleanup of this site has come to an end after 16 years of work. (anthony story) PHOTO BY LARRY WILLIAMS / POST DISPATCH

MONDAY, FEB. 27, 2006 - A group of about sixty people holding signs listened to Denise Brock, their advocate speaker, in hopes of receiving some kind of retrobution from the Government or Mallincrodt, because of their or a loved ones sickness, usually cancer, caused by past years of work for Mallincrodt. Brock is the acting advocate for several sites throughout the US. where there was a chemical clean-up site. PHOTO BY SAM LEONE / PD

Denise Brock, whose father was a former Mallinckrodt Chemical Co. plant worker and died of lung cancer, responds to questions from the media with U.S. Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., at her side during a news conference Monday, Jan. 31, 2005, in St. Louis. Bond was in St. Louis Monday to update the latest developments in his effort to help former nuclear workers now suffering from cancer. (AP Photo/James A. Finley)

(11/15/2001 Thursday) Weldon Spring, Mo.-Workmen at the Weldon Spring Site Remedial Action Project grade fields surrounding the seven-story tall disposal cell as a gaggle of Canada Geese fly overhead. The area was once the nation's largest munitions plant and also a processing plant for the Atomic Energy Commission. PHOTO BY KEVIN MANNING

(11/15/2001 Thursday) Weldon Spring, Mo.-Radiation hazard signs still adorn a fence separating the public from a quarry at the Weldon Spring Site Remedial Action Project. The quarry once contained radioactive materials such as thorium and has been cleaned up and the water de-contaminated and released in to the Missouri River. PHOTO BY KEVIN MANNING

(Tues 8/3/99) Field Engineer Andrea Biske tests a layer of contaminanats Tuesday at the Weldon Spring Remedial Site. The site contains remnants of radioactive Uranium from an old Uranium plant from 1955-66. The life of the Uranium remnants can only be measured in the billions of years, so it will remain in the soil below layers of shielding rocks clay and plastic. The project will connect Katy trail and Busch Wildlife Center with a bike trail that should be open to the public in 2002. PHOTO BY JAMIE RECTOR

At the former Weldon Spring Ordnance Works, this red streaked pile of soil has been put through the incinerator to remove chemical and metals from TNT and DNT manufacturing.

A worker taking a break at an incinerator on the site of the Old Weldon Spring Ordnance Works. The incinerator is being used to clean the soil and pipelines contaminated by TNT and DNT manufacturing. NOTE: This is not a dioxin incinerator.

(4/23/1996 Tuesday) Weldon Spring, Mo.--A worker from Covera Abatement examines rusted rums found in athe old Weldon Spring uranium plant which were found to be contaminated with PCB's. Workers also discovered drums contaminated with sludge formed from processing uranium and thorium. PHOTO BY KEVIN MANNING

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