Norton Visits Spring Valley Site Where Amounts of Mustard Agent Were Found By Army Corp (8/14/09)
Norton to Visit Spring Valley Site Where Small Amounts of Mustard Agent Were Found by Army Corps
August 14, 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) will go to the Spring Valley neighborhood on Wednesday, August 19th to inspect for herself the site where small amounts of mustard agent were found by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on August 4th. She will visit the area around the house owned by American University at 4825 Glenbrook Road, NW where excavation work is underway and where the flask containing the mustard agent was found. For 16 years the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been cleaning areas in Spring Valley where World War I toxic munitions were buried by the Army and accidentally uncovered by residents decades later.
Norton met yesterday with U.S. Army Corps Commander Colonel David Anderson on the clean-up of Spring Valley and was shown a photograph of the mustard agent found at the bottom of a flask in "trace amounts." The flask was taken to a laboratory in Edgewood, MD and, Norton was told, was found not to pose a risk to public health.
The Congresswoman held a hearing in June and is awaiting further information, including identification of the substances that have been found and the effects on underground water.