[CPEO-MEF] Army looks for Cold War relics

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Illinois
DAILY HERALD
Army looks for Cold War relics
By Jon Davis Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted 6/18/03

The Army Corps of Engineers is digging trenches in two Arlington Heights
parks to check for potential Cold War relics.

A radar survey conducted last summer showed clusters of underground
blips in Heritage Park and the Kingsbridge Arboretum that might be fuel
or oil storage tanks left from the 1950s and early 1960s, when the parks
were parts of a Nike missile base.

If tanks are found, the Corps will seal them off and return next month
to remove them, under a 20-year-old project known as FUDS - the Formerly
Used Defense Site environmental cleanup program at ex-military sites.

Engineers checked six sites Tuesday in the arboretum at Kaspar Avenue
and Victoria Lane and will check five sites today in Heritage Park, 506
W. Victoria Lane.

Arlington Heights Park District spokeswoman Nancy Chamberlain said the
Army Corps' activities won't interfere with any program activities,
although Heritage's playground might be off limits for a while.

"It's their project. We're cooperating with them as best we can,"
Chamberlain said.

Arlington Heights was one of three Northwest suburban Nike sites, and
the first one to undergo this kind of environmental cleanup, said
Kimberlee Turner, public affairs specialist in the Corps' Louisville,
Ky., district, which oversees cleanup efforts in Illinois, Indiana,
Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio. The defense site cleanup program began in
1983, but "now we have some funds to go in and explore that," Turner
said.

This article can be viewed at:
http://www.dailyherald.com/search/main_story.asp?intid=3779010

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