Blast Box

Description

The Donovan Blast Chamber, named for its inventor, John Donovan, was the first system approved by the Army for destroying non-chemical mortars and shells unearthed at former military munitions ranges. Other blast chambers have since been produced. The mobile chamber is a steel box-within-a-box that sits on a tractor-trailer. Munitions with an equivalent of up to 13 pounds of trinitrotoluene (TNT) are wrapped in explosives. The package is placed inside the armor-plated inner chamber and detonated. Plastic bags filled with water are hung inside the chamber to help quench the 5,600-degree fireball, and an air pollution control unit filters the fumes.

Limitations and Concerns

If disposing of large quantities of bulk munitions per year, using the chamber will take too long to be of use.

The Army stated that even with a blast chamber on site, it will still have to burn or detonate some shells in place if they are too dangerous to handle. The standard T-10 chamber can not handle munitions above 81mm in size.

Applicability

The Donovan Blast Chamber and similar configurations are used mainly to detonate unexploded ordnance. It is also being tested for chemical warfare materiel destruction, and the tests so far show that it results in a 99.99% destruction rate.

Technology Development Status

The technology is commercially available. Larger versions of the Donovan blast box are being developed.

Web Links

http://www.demil.net/

Other Resources and Demonstrations

Three makers of blast boxes can be contacted below: Chrysler Daimler Benz (Tim Tapp at 703-893-0330, HumaHuma7@aol.com or Thomas Schenkel at 82 52 99-64 11 (Schrobenhausen, Germany), EST.MEKa@t-online.de] Donovan Demolition (John Donovan at 309-963-4425, Robert Parman at 502-676-3192 or Michael Frakes at 309-963-4425). Among other locations, a Donovan mobile blast chamber is being used to destroy non-chemical unexploded munitions found at Camp Edwards on Cape Cod, in Massachusetts.

NABCO (Randy Markey at 412-231-8558, www.nabcoinc.com) makes small detonation chambers for terrorist bombs, including those with chemical or biological agents.