Anniston Army Depot (ANAD) is a major

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary Land warfare, land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of th ...

facility for the production and repair of

ground combat vehicle The Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) was a program initiated by the United States Army in 2009, with the goal of developing a next-generation armored fighting vehicle. The first variant of the GCV to be developed would be an infantry fighting vehicle ...

s, overhaul of Small Arms Weapon Systems and the storage of

chemical weapon A chemical weapon (CW) is a specialized munition that uses chemicals formulated to inflict death or harm on humans. According to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), this can be any chemical compound intended as ...

s, a.k.a. the Anniston Chemical Activity. The depot is located in Bynum, Alabama. The

Department of the Army The United States Department of the Army (DA) is one of the three military departments within the United States Department of Defense. The DA is the federal government agency within which the United States Army (U.S.) is organized. It is led ...

established the site in 1940, buying in Calhoun County, where Anniston is the county seat. The site was originally a munitions storage facility, and, later, a disposal facility. ANAD was placed on the

Superfund Superfund is a United States federal environmental remediation program established by the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA). The program is administered by the United States Environmental Pro ...

National Priorities List The National Priorities List (NPL) is the priority list of hazardous waste sites in the United States eligible for long-term remedial investigation and remedial action (cleanup) financed under the federal Superfund program. Environmental Protec ...

in 1990 because of soil and groundwater contamination with

antimony Antimony is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Sb () and atomic number 51. A lustrous grey metal or metalloid, it is found in nature mainly as the sulfide mineral stibnite (). Antimony compounds have been known since ancient t ...

, chromium, lead,

thallium Thallium is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Tl and atomic number 81. It is a silvery-white post-transition metal that is not found free in nature. When isolated, thallium resembles tin, but discolors when exposed to air. Che ...

and

trichloroethylene Trichloroethylene (TCE) is an organochloride with the formula C2HCl3, commonly used as an industrial metal-degreasing solvent. It is a clear, colourless, non-flammable, volatile liquid with a chloroform-like pleasant mild smell and sweet taste.

Geography

The depot is located in Calhoun County, Alabama, west of Anniston. It covers of land, or . Its northern side is the Pelham Range portion of Fort McClellan. The central and northern portions of the depot span over and serve as an ammunition storage area. The southern side of the depot is the Southeastern Industrial Area (SIA), a industrial operations area with more than 50 buildings and a vehicle test track.

Description

As of 2014, the depot employs 3,800 civilian workers. Tanks and other equipment are repaired and tested, but historically Anniston's main role since World War II has been as a major munitions storage site. Anniston is one of seven depots in the United States where chemical weapons were stored (7.2% of nation's chemical weapons stockpile). The stockpile has included rockets, bombs, projectiles, and land mines armed with Sarin, VX nerve agent, or

mustard gas Mustard gas or sulfur mustard are names commonly used for the organosulfur compound, organosulfur chemical compound bis(2-chloroethyl) sulfide, which has the chemical structure S(CH2CH2Cl)2, as well as other Chemical species, species. In the wi ...

. The last chemical munitions were destroyed in September 2011. ANAD is the only depot capable of performing maintenance on heavy-tracked combat vehicles and their components and houses a state of the art Small Arms Overhaul facility, which opened in January 2012 to replace an outdated facility. The depot is designated as the Center of Technical Excellence for the M1 Abrams Tank and is the designated candidate depot for the repair of the M60 Patton tank, AVLB (Armoured vehicle-launched bridge), M728 Combat Engineer Vehicle, M88 Recovery Vehicle and M551 'Sheridan' Armored Reconnaissance/Airborne Assault vehicles. During the

Iraq War The Iraq War (), also referred to as the Second Gulf War, was a prolonged conflict in Iraq lasting from 2003 to 2011. It began with 2003 invasion of Iraq, the invasion by a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition, which ...

, over 1,000 M1 tanks, Howitzers, and other armored vehicles were stored awaiting re-engineering. ANAD is the Army's primary site for final assembly, reset, and overhaul for the

Stryker The Stryker is a family of Eight-wheel drive, eight-wheeled armored fighting vehicles derived from the Canadian LAV III. Stryker vehicles are produced by General Dynamics Land Systems-Canada (GDLS-C) for the United States Army in a plant in L ...

family of wheeled fighting vehicles.Anniston Army Depot marks a decade of Stryker
US Army, 1 page, 2012 All ten of the Stryker vehicle variants are assembled in the Nichols Industrial Park area by contractor

General Dynamics General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American publicly traded aerospace and defense corporation headquartered in Reston, Virginia. As of 2020, it was the fifth largest defense contractor in the world by arms sales and fifth largest in the Unit ...

− Land Systems. Stryker battle damage repair and reset is accomplished through a work sharing arrangement between the depot and contractor, including a Stryker Exchange Program that converts the original flat bottomed Stryker vehicle to the IED-resistant Double V Hull configuration developed for combat operations in Afghanistan. The depot houses and operates a facility for the repair, restoration, and/or upgrade of infantry weapons such as the

Beretta M9 The Beretta M9, officially the Pistol, Semiautomatic, 9mm, M9, is the designation for the Beretta 92FS semi-automatic pistol used by the United States Armed Forces. The M9 was adopted by the United States military as their service pistol in 1 ...

pistol,

M16 rifle The M16 (officially Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16) is a family of assault rifles adapted from the ArmaLite AR-15 rifle for the United States Armed Forces, United States military. The original M16 was a 5.56×45mm NATO, 5.56×45mm automatic ...

, and M2 machine gun. Any firearm deemed unusable or obsolete is destroyed on the premises, the materials are reduced to unusable pieces and then sold for scrap to be melted down.

Organizational structure

ANAD is under command of the US Army TACOM Life Cycle Management Command (TACOM LCMC), although other operators on the facility include the

Defense Logistics Agency The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) is a combat support agency in the United States Department of Defense, United States Department of Defense (DoD). The agency is staffed by more than 26,000 civilian and military personnel throughout the world. ...

, Defense Reutilization and Marketing Office,

United States Army Center of Military History The United States Army Center of Military History (CMH) is a directorate within the United States Army Training and Doctrine Command. The Institute of Heraldry remains within the Office of the Administrative Assistant to the Secretary of the Arm ...

, Health Services Command, Soldier and Biological Chemical Command, and the

Civilian Marksmanship Program The Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP) is a national organization dedicated to training and educating U.S. citizens in responsible uses of firearms and airguns through gun safety training, marksmanship training, and competitions. The CMP is a f ...

Environmental problems

In 1989, the EPA placed part of the Depot on the

(NPL), and one year later, the EPA and the Army agreed to address the entire Depot under the

for

, chromium, lead,

and

in ground water and soils. Since then, contaminated ground water has been pumped and treated, contaminated soil has either been dug up or capped, and land use controls have been put in place. Contaminated fractured bedrock needs to be addressed. Since 1998, the Depot has a Restoration Advisory Board (RAB) composed of community members and representatives from the Depot and other agencies. Removal from NPL is expected in 2047.

References

External links

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Brief at Global Security
* {{ALMilitary, state=autocollapse United States Army logistics installations Military installations in Alabama Anniston, Alabama Buildings and structures in Calhoun County, Alabama Military Superfund sites Superfund sites in Alabama Military installations established in 1940 1940 establishments in Alabama