The clean up of a former army base continues outside of Kodiak

Mitch Borden/KMXT

For over 20 years, the US Army Corps of Engineers has been working on cleaning up a piece of land just outside the City of Kodiak. After removing tons of soil contaminated by an old military site, it’s finally looking like the end of the process may be closing in.

During World War II the US Army and Navy flocked to Kodiak and hunkered down at a  military base just outside of the city of Kodiak.

“Old photos show that there was essentially a town there. I think there was somewhere around, in the nature of 10,000 troops stationed here. A lot of buildings. A lot of barracks. A lot of mess halls.”

Greg Vanagel is leading the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers effort to clean up a part of the old base that the army left contaminated by toxic chemicals. The project is focusing on a piece of land called the Greely Road Garrison Lube Pits, which is where cars were worked on.

Vanagel says parts the base, like the lube pits, were constructed quickly because a lot of it was built during WWII.

“You know, it was kind of a fast and furious kinda operation to try and ramp up to our defenses in place when we were facing an invasion by the Japanese in the Aleutians.”

Protecting the environment wasn’t on a lot of people’s minds in the 1940’s. And since things were so hectic fuel and other chemicals weren’t properly stored and seeped into the ground, making the area possible dangerous for humans almost 80 years later.

“There wasn’t as much thought given to what was left behind back in those days.”

Since the clean up started in the mid-90s, the Army Corps of Engineers removed the lube pits underground storage tanks and thousands of tons of contaminated soil. Some of the dangerous chemicals seeped too deep to excavate though. So, Vanagel and his team are proposing a plan to pump air into the ground and suck it out to extract the toxins.

It could take a while, but Vanagel says this plan should make the land and the groundwater in the area safe.

“We anticipate the process might take as long as 3 years to fully reduce the contaminants to an acceptable level and then we’ll have another year or so of monitoring to make sure that we’ve achieved what we think we’ve achieved.”

The purpose of this project Vanagel says is to protect people. Right now, there’s nothing built on the parcel of land, but there could be in the future.

“Primarily what we’re addressing is the risk to future users of the site and if there’s a future residential development there or future use of groundwater at the sight we hope to clean the site up so that any use there be no limitation on future use.”

The military buildup in Alaska had a lot of effects all over the state. On Kodiak, there are 25 formerly used defense sites that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are in charge of. Not all them need to be decontaminated, but Vanagel says there’s a lot more work to be done around Kodiak.

The US Army Corp of Engineers are taking public comment on their plan for the Greely Road Garrison Lube Pits. Comment can be given until March 12th. After that, Vanagel is hoping the plan will be approved and work will begin soon after.