Detonation of 3 Shells Rescheduled

The detonation of three, 30-year-old artillery shells found at Rocketdyne’s Santa Susana Field Lab has been postponed until today because county fire officials were working to extinguish small blazes Monday.

The exact origin of the three small shells--all a foot or less long and believed to be live--is not known. Workers engaged in a $55-million cleanup of Rocketdyne’s property found the devices Wednesday in a brush-covered ravine in the Happy Valley-area field lab.

The 2,668-acre open-air Santa Susana Field Laboratory, nestled in the hills between the Simi and San Fernando valleys, opened in 1947. It has been the site of nuclear and rocket engine research.

The shells were scheduled to be detonated Monday, with Fire Department and state Department of Toxic Substances Control officials present. But fire crews were battling blazes in Ojai and Simi Valley, Rocketdyne spokesman Dan Beck said.

Company officials hope to learn what the shells are and where they came from once they are detonated and can be examined.

“If there is anything in there but filler, my experts say it is probably a small quantity of high explosive, such as TNT,” Beck said. “They do know for sure that it’s not any sort of liquid chemical in there.”

The shells are believed to be the remnants of Rocketdyne’s work creating the motors for “projectiles, whether rockets, missiles or artillery shells,” about three decades ago.