Ammunition Being Retired, Recycled -- Salvage Company Profits By Turning Modern-Day Swords Into Plowshares

HERNDON, W.Va. - Millions of old bullets, surplus of the Cold War, meet their inglorious end deep in the Appalachian Mountains.

Talon Manufacturing Inc., operating in an abandoned coal mine and schoolhouse, is recycling thousands of tons of bullets, brass casings and gunpowder, and even their metal storage boxes.

"This is a salvage operation. This is the junkyard of the ammunition business," said Charles Dublin, chief executive officer and a retired Marine major. "Recycling, buddy. That's what it's all about."

Talon began recycling small-arms ammunition as old bullets began piling up after 1988 environmental rules temporarily shut down incinerators where they were usually destroyed.

Some of the cartridges are up to 50 years old, once destined for M-1 rifles of World War II. Others are ammunition for modern M-16 rifles, .50-caliber machine guns and 20-mm cannons.

Officials say the military has too much obsolete and excess ammunition, less storage space because of base closings and greater restrictions on how to dispose of it.

Brig. Gen. Joe Arbuckle, deputy chief of staff for munitions at the Army Materiel Command in Alexandria, Va., said the excess ammunition is a product of the Cold War.

There are 400,000 tons of ammunition awaiting "demilitarization," and the stockpile is growing. Arbuckle said the military wants money to "demil" 110,000 tons a year through 2004. Meanwhile, ammunition plants make more.

About 4,000 tons a year are shipped to Talon's abandoned coal mine in Wyoming County where 170 people work.

On a recent afternoon, about 1,800 pallets rested in a dusty storage area surrounded by barbed wire, surveillance cameras and private guards while awaiting a further 11-mile trip by truck to a former high school for processing.

Nearby, 1.9 million fuses from artillery shells await recycling.

The modern equivalent of beating swords into plowshares is dangerous work.

The artillery fuses pack enough bang to blow away fingers. Primer from bullets is volatile until it is rendered chemically inert. And no one is careless with gunpowder.

The recycled materials are either shipped to a separate Talon division in Paw Paw to be reassembled into practice ammunition or sold as scrap.

Heavy metals and other environmental hazards are rendered harmless and disposed of.

Dublin said recycling small-caliber ammo will save the government about $70 million over 10 years.

The company expects up to $12 million in revenues this year.