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Dugway Proving Ground (DPG) is a US Army facility located approximately 85 miles (140 km) southwest of Salt Lake City, Utah. It encompasses approximately 800,000 acres (32 km²) of the Great Salt Lake Desert and is surrounded on three sides by mountain ranges.
The transcontinental Lincoln Highway passed through the present site of the Dugway Proving Ground, the only significant section of the old highway closed to the public. At least one old wood bridge over a creek still stands.*
Mission
Dugway's mission is to test US and Allied biological and chemical weapon defense systems in a secure and isolated environment. DPG also serves as a facility for US Army Reserve and US National Guard maneuver training, and US Air Force flight tests. DPG is controlled by the US Army Test and Evaluation Command (TECOM).
History
In 1941, the Chemical Warfare Service (CWS) determined it needed a testing facility more remote than the US Army's Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland. The CWS surveyed the Western U.S. for a new location to conduct its tests, and, in the spring of 1942, construction of Dugway Proving Ground began.
Testing commenced in the summer of 1942. During World War II, DPG tested toxic agents, flamethrowers, chemical spray systems, biological warfare weapons, antidotes for chemical agents, and protective clothing. In October 1943, DPG established biological warfare facilities at an isolated area within DPG (Granite Peak). DPG was slowly phased out after World War II, until becoming inactive in August 1946. The base was reactivated during the Korean War and in 1954 was confirmed as a permanent Department of the Army installation. In October 1958, DPG became home to the U.S. Army Chemical, Biological, and Radiological (CBR) Weapons School, which moved from the U.S. Army Chemical Center, MD.
In March 1968, 6,249 sheep had fallen sick in Skull Valley, an area nearly thirty miles from Dugway's testing sites. When examined, the sheep were found to have been poisoned by an organophosphate chemical, possibly a pesticide. Because of local open air tests of the nerve agent VX, local attention focused on the Army, who did not admit to liability but paid the ranchers for their losses (the sheep herds were uninsured). On the official record, the claim was for 4,372 disabled sheep, of which about half were put down by the ranchers, plus costs for another 1,877 sheep permanently injured or that were potentially exposed (not sick) but not marketable. The incident, coinciding with the birth of the environmental movement and anti-Vietnam War protests, created an uproar in Utah and the international community.
Because of the secretive nature of the work conducted at DPG, many rumors have circulated about activities going on inside. These rumors include things related to UFOs and unauthorized testing of weapons of mass destruction.
U.S. General Accounting Office report
The U.S. General Accounting Office issued a report on September 28, 1994, which stated that between 1940 and 1974, DOD and other national security agencies studied hundreds of thousands of human subjects in tests and experiments involving hazardous substances.
The quote from the study:
... Dugway Proving Ground is a military testing facility located approximately 80 miles from Salt Lake City. For several decades, Dugway has been the site of testing for various chemical and biological agents. From 1951 through 1969, hundreds, perhaps thousands of open-air tests using bacteria and viruses that cause disease in human, animals, and plants were conducted at Dugway... It is unknown how many people in the surrounding vicinity were also exposed to potentially harmful agents used in open-air tests at Dugway."Is Military Research Hazardous to Veterans Health? Lessons Spanning Half A Century" 103rd Congress, 2nd Session-S. Prt. 103-97; Staff Report prepared for the committee on veterans' affairs, December 8, 1994, John D. Rockefeller IV, West Virginia, Chairman.*
References
External links
United States Army research facilities | Biological warfare | Chemical warfare | Lincoln Highway
"Dugway Proving Ground"