Army Gets $16 Million to Clear Tierrasanta of Leftover Ammo

The Army Corps of Engineers has been given the go-ahead by the U.S. Department of Defense to spend more than $16 million to clean up old munitions from the canyons around Tierrasanta where two boys were killed in December, 1983.

The Defense Department, which initially approved $16.2 million seven months ago, released the money to the Corps of Engineers for a comprehensive program to clean up ordnance in the area where the Marine Corps conducted live-fire training exercises before the land was subdivided for residential development.

Since Matthew Paul Smith and Corey Alden Peake, both 8, were killed by a World War II-era anti-tank shell they found in a canyon near their home, Navy ordnance teams have found 202 pieces of munitions, about 25% of them still explosive.

“The problem in getting to this point has been getting the Army Corps of Engineers to come up with solutions to clean up the canyon,” said Ben Haddad, a Washington aide to Rep. Bill Lowery (R-San Diego).

A public meeting to discuss plans to clean up the canyons will be held at 7 p.m. May 30 at Tierrasanta Elementary School.

Proposals to rid the area of dangerous munitions range from sweeping the area manually and then erecting a fence to more sophisticated plans involving instruments that detect the chemicals in explosives, Haddad said.

Tierrasanta, a 2,600-acre planned community, was built on part of Camp Elliott, a 43-square-mile Marine Corps training base and artillery range during World War II. About 320 acres of open space will be targeted for the cleanup.