Military

Letterkenny Army Depot

Letterkenny Army Depot, located at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania is a depot installation reporting to the U.S. Army Industrial Operations Command at Rock Island, Illinois. Letterkenny Army Depot operates a maintenance and ammunition depot for the receipt, storage, issue, maintenance, and disposal of assigned commodities. Letterkenny Army Depot also provides administrative, logistic, and facilities support to tenants and attached organizations.

Effective 01 October 1999, command and control of the Letterkenny Munitions Center (LEMC) transferred to Crane Army Ammunition Activity. It is aligned as a directorate in CAAA's organizational structure, although it is physically located at Letterkenny Army Depot (LEAD), Chambersburg, PA, as a tenant. ) The mission of Letterkenny Munitions Center is to receive, store, issue, renovate, and demilitarize conventional ammunition. They assemble, disassemble, and test (commonly referred to as "All-Up-Rounding") various Air Force and Navy missile systems. LEMC also maintains/modifies missiles and their components, and has the capability to build certain missiles. LEMC is the Army's only depot for the Army Tactical Missile System. In addition to the LEMC facility at LEAD, five LEMC personnel are permanently assigned in Weilerach, Germany to support U.S. Army Europe and Southwest Asia units.

Letterkenny Army Depot's ammunition mission occupies 12,000 acres, with more than 2.2 million square feet of floor space, as well as 902 earth-covered igloos, 10 above-ground igloos, and 100 inert storage locations. In addition to the receipt, storage, and issue of ammunition, Letterkenny Army Depot has the capability to perform maintenance on munitions components, surveillance on ammunition and guided missiles, and disposal of up to 10,000 lbs. of ammunition per day through demilitarization, burning, or processing through a deactivation furnace.

Letterkenny Army Depot employs nearly 2,000 civilian personnel, three military personnel, and 497 contractor personnel. The depot includes 19,243 acres and 1,780 buildings with 8.4 million square feet of floor space. Letterkenny Army Depot's annual operating budget is $220 million, with an annual payroll of $66 million and local procurement totaling $9.6 million.

On December 18, 1941, the Secretary of War directed the acquisition of land in central Pennsylvania for the storage of ammunition and general supplies. This mission later expanded to include the maintenance of combat and transportation vehicles. This maintenance mission has continually expanded to include electronic equipment, radar, and missile systems. Although the general supply mission transferred to the Defense Logistics Agency in 1992, Letterkenny Army Depot retains its ammunition storage mission.

Base Realignment and Closure 93 postured Letterkenny Army Depot as the Defense Department's specialized missile components and missile support equipment Center of Technical Excellence and the integrated depot-level maintenance facility. Letterkenny Army Depot has joined United Defense, Limited Partnership in a model teaming program for the production of the Army's latest M109 Self-Propelled Howitzer'the Paladin.

Base Realignment and Closure 95 transitioned all towed and self-propelled artillery to Anniston Army Depot. The Base Realignment and Closure commission also recommended privatization of tactical missile guidance and control, or transition to Tobyhanna Army Depot.

Letterkenny Army Depot serves as the Industrial Operations Command's Center of Technical Excellence for the Homing All the Way Killer (Phase I); Phased Array Tracking to Interception of Target; and Paladin, Avenger, Sparrow, Hellfire, and Hazard Minimization. Letterkenny Army Depot is the organic depot for the overhaul, test, repair, and/or modification for Dragon; Tube-launched, Optically Tracked Wire Bradley; Tube-launched, Optically Tracked Wire 2; Tube-launched, Optically Tracked Wire Cobra; Phoenix; Air to Air Stinger; Sidewinder; High Speed Anti Radar Missile; Army Tactical Missile System; Towed Howitzers (M101, M102, M114, M115, M116, M120, M198 families); Self-Propelled Howitzers (M109 and M110 families); and the M578 Recovery Vehicles. The following Tactical Missile systems are transitioning to Letterkenny Army Depot: Multiple Launch Rocket System; Shillelagh; Land Combat Support System; Maverick; and Advanced Medium Range Air to Air Missile.

In addition to the typical facilities that provide Letterkenny Army Depot the capability to perform depot level maintenance on a wide variety of equipment, the Depot has many specialized facilities associated with its assigned maintenance and ammunition missions:

Tritium Facility ' Licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Letterkenny Army Depot has a specially designed facility for the repair of self-luminous sources for fire control components.

Nuclear Biological and Chemical Filter Testing ' Letterkenny Army Depot provides training, conducts testing, designs nuclear biological and chemical filter components, and performs nondestructive testing and maintenance on nuclear biological and chemical filter systems.

Radiographic Inspection Facility 'This facility houses a 320-Kilovolt x-ray machine and a 25-Megavolt betatron x-ray machine which provide Letterkenny Army Depot with the capability to x-ray through up to 20 inches of steel.

Firing Range ' Letterkenny Army Depot's firing range can accommodate everything from small arms to howitzers, tanks, and antitank missiles.

Flexible Computer Integrated Manufacturing, Computer Numerical Control/Manual Data Interface, and Computer Aided Design/Computer Aided Manufacturing ' Automation, business practices, and equipment are integrated to focus on support of customers.

Letterkenny Army Depot has a support agreement with the Air Force to store, test, and ship Shrike, Sparrow, Sidewinder, and High Speed Anti Radar Missiles, and to upround Sparrow and Sidewinder missiles.

BRAC 2005

Secretary of Defense Recommendations: In its 2005 BRAC Recommendations, DoD recommended that the Red River Depot be closed. As a result, DoD recommended to relocate Red River's depot maintenance of Tactical Vehicles to both Tobyhanna Army Depot and Letterkenny Depot, PA. Red River's depot maintenance of Tactical Missiles was also relocated to Letterkenny Army Depot.

Another recommendation was to consolidate depot maintenance of Tactical Missiles, formerly at Marine Corps Logistics Base Barstow, CA, at Letterkenny.

In another recommendation, DoD recommended to realign Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach, CA, by relocateing the depot maintenance of Tactical Missiles to Letterkenny Army Depot.

In another recommendation, DoD would realign Rock Island Arsenal, IL, by relocating the depot maintenance of Other Equipment and Tactical Vehicles to Letterkenny Army Depot.

Secretary of Defense Justification: This first recommendation would reinforce Letterkenny's role as a Center of Industrial and Technical Excellence for and Missile Systems.

The second recommendation would follow the strategy of minimizing sites using maximum capacity of 1.5 shifts while maintaining a west coast depot maintenance presence at Marine Corps Logistics Base Barstow to provide west coast operating forces with a close, responsive source for depot maintenance support. As a result of the consolidation, Letterkenny would be in Marginal Non-attainment for Ozone (1-Hour and 8-Hour) and an Air Conformity determination would be required.

The third recommendation would support depot maintenance function elimination at Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach and would follow the strategy of minimizing sites using maximum capacity at 1.5 shifts. Environmentally, this recommendation would have an expected to impact air quality at Letterkenny AD.

The fourth recommendation would increase overall depot capability utilization by consolidating Rock Island's remaining Tactical Vehicle workload and capability at Letterkenny, the depot with the highest Military Value for Tactical Vehicle maintenance. This recommendation would also facilitate future interservice utilization of DoD depot maintenance capacity. Environmentally, this recommendation would have an expected impact to air quality at Letterkenny AD.

Community Concerns: There were no formal expressions from the community regarding recommendation two.

Commission Findings: The Commission agreed with the Secretary of Defense that the proposed realignment of Marine Corps Logistics Base Barstow, CA will decrease the cost of depot maintenance operations across DoD while increasing the military value to the Warfighter. The community's contentions that cycle times would be degraded, and the quality of work would suffer, were not supported by the Commission's review and analysis. The realignment recommendation will leave in place sufficient depot surge capacity while generating cost savings.

Commission Recommendations: The Commission found the Secretary's recommendation consistent with the final selection criteria and the Force Structure Plan. Therefore, the Commission approves the recommendation of the Secretary.