Blue Grass Army Depot
Blue Grass Army Depot (BGAD) is a U.S. Army storage facility for conventional munitions and chemical weapons. The facility is located in east central Kentucky, southeast of the cities of Lexington and Richmond, Kentucky. The 14,494-acre (58.66 km2) site, composed mainly of open fields and wooded areas, is used for munitions storage, repair of general supplies, and the disposal of munitions. The installation is used for the storage of conventional explosive munitions as well as assembled chemical weapons. The depot primarily is involved in industrial and related activities associated with the storage and maintenance of conventional and chemical munitions.
The tenant organization, Blue Grass Chemical Activity, is responsible for the chemical weapons stored at BGAD. BGCA is part of the Army's Chemical Materiels Activity, headquartered in Edgewood, Maryland. The demilitarization of the chemical weapons is the responsibility of a third organization, Assembled Chemical Weapons Alternatives (ACWA).
BGAD provides munitions, chemical defense equipment, and ammunition support to the joint warfighter. It is the Department of Defense's primary center for surveillance, receipt, storage, issue, testing and minor repair for the Chemical Defense Equipment Program. BGAD maintains and supports CDE stocks for deploying units and homeland defense forces, and is a training site for reserve component and other deploying units.
Capabilities include: industrial services support; ammunition maintenance, renovation, disassembly and demilitarization; thermal arc coating for Air Force bombs; water washout facility with flaker belt; molten salt research and development; ultrasonic testing for mortar ammunition; chemical material surveillance; quality assurance and joint logistics support; and ammunition life cycle management.
The depot also serves as a large training ground for service members.
BGAD was established in 1941 and began operations in 1942 as an ammunition and general supply storage depot, Blue Grass Ordnance Depot. In 1964, it merged with the Lexington Signal Depot in Avon, Kentucky, to become the Lexington-Blue Grass Army Depot. The Lexington facility was selected for closure under BRAC (Base Realignment And Closure); after it closed in September 1999, the remaining facility received its current designation.
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