ABSTRACT
The soil within firing ranges across the US has been heavily contaminated with lead bullets that hit the ground and impact berm. The lead bullets can be found as whole bullets or fragments. Lead smears on soil particles and lead oxide also exist. Consequently, there is a growing need to treat these firing range soils to prevent public exposure to the lead-laden soil and the leaching of the lead into the ground water. Representative soil samples were collected from the small arms firing ranges at the selected bases. The pilot plant was designed to initially deagglomerate firing range soil in the attrition scrubber and trommel. A mobile soil washing process design for lead recovery from firing range soils was shown to be feasible in the demonstration at Naval Air Station Miramar. The vat leach plant treated the dewatered gravel and sand soil fractions leaving the jig and Reichert spiral concentrators.
