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Monday, July 16, 2007
Ind. Decisions - Federal Judge McKinney to hear case on nerve agent waste
Rick Callahan of the AP reports today in a story that begins:
INDIANAPOLIS -- Opponents of the Army's shipments of nerve agent waste from Indiana to Texas will ask a federal judge today to block the shipments, contending that the liquid waste poses an imminent threat to public health and is more toxic than the Army claims.U.S. District Judge Larry McKinney has set aside up to three days to hear testimony from witnesses for the Army and environmental and activist groups.
The hearing in Indianapolis comes about a month after the Army agreed to suspend the shipments from western Indiana to Port Arthur, Texas, until McKinney decides whether to block the transfers of the waste created by the destruction of the deadly VX nerve agent.
On May 8, the Sierra Club, the Chemical Weapons Working Group and other groups sued the Army, seeking a preliminary injunction to halt the shipments of the hydrolysate that's being produced by a VX destruction project at the Newport Chemical Depot.
VX is a Cold War-era chemical weapon so deadly that only a droplet can kill a human. It is being destroyed in chemical reactors at Newport, about 30 miles north of Terre Haute.
The lawsuit claims the 900-mile truck shipments of the VX hydrolysate from Newport through eight states to Port Arthur pose "an imminent and substantial endangerment" to public health and the environment and violate state and federal laws.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 16, 2007 11:00 AM
Posted to Environment | Ind Fed D.Ct. Decisions