(OMAHA WORLD HERALD) The Omaha World Herald reports, "The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered a new investigation of contamination at the former Cornhusker Army Ammunition Plant west of Grand Island, including the possible dumping of waste from Hurricane Katrina. The investigation was prompted by reports of severe health problems suffered by two former workers of DTE Rail Services and reports of the unloading of a hurricane waste train in summer 2006 at the DTE site. DTE Rail Services offers railcar repairs and storage. 'The issue with the potential of exposure at DTE Rail Services got this on the radar,' said Bill Gresham, remediation project manager at the protection agency's Kansas City, Mo., office. 'It's been raised relatively recently.' DTE is located at the former Cornhusker Army Ammunition Plant west of Grand Island. The 20-square-mile Cornhusker plant was built in 1942 and produced artillery shells, mines, bombs and rockets for World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. It was put on standby status in 1973 and declared excess in 1989. The public sale of the land began in 1998. RDX, a compound used in manufacturing explosives, was discovered in groundwater under the plant in the 1980s and was tracked in a groundwater plume that crossed northwest Grand Island and still exists. Gresham said there was a “pretty fair effort in evaluating the site,” but something could have been missed.
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