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1 1 11/5/80 The purpose of having the open pit is to destroy very unstable and explosive chemicals in a safe manner. This is accomplishes by detonating (with a 22 caliber rifle) and incineration. The following procedures seems to do a good job of destroying everything we take there. Upon arrival at the pit we decide which direction the wind is from in order to avoid the fumes that may result. We approach the pit upwind. The first chemicals we destroy are the small containers of solids (picric crystals, ether crystals, etc.). We individually unpack and toss them gently into the open pit, making sure each one is pierced by a 22 caliber bullet. The second set of chemicals we toss in are our small containers of liquids (ether, picric acid not totally crystallized, etc. ). We also make sure each one is pierced by our rifle. - The third step is the destruction of unstable metals (No in oil, Potassium in oil, etc. ). These are also pierced by our rifle. Since most of our chemicals are in small containers it is imperative that we have a clear -view of these containers until they are punctured. In order to accomplish this, we save our large containers until all the smaller ones have been eliminated. Also we try to avoid a fire until they have all been detonated by our rifle. This brings us to our last group of chemicals which consist of the larger con- tainers and bottles of perchloric acid. At this point, the first bottle of perchloric acid usually initiates incineration. We usually like the pit to continue to burn to insure complete degradation 1 so we then toss in all the surrounding cardboard containers and packing material to aid in the complete combustion of the chemicals. When the fire finally dies the ashes are soaked with water to put out the fire and any decompose water reactive chemicals remaining. The ashes are then sprayed with fire extinguishers which contain basic ammonium phosphate. PAR:cs 1