What went wrong at military’s ‘Super Pond’ in Maryland?

What went wrong at military’s ‘Super Pond’ in Maryland?
By Justin George
The Baltimore Sun
Published: March 6, 2013

BALTIMORE — Shaped like a teardrop and carved out of the eastern bank of the Bush River in Maryland, the UNDEX Test Facility at Aberdeen Proving Ground has earned the nickname “Super Pond” for its unusual properties.

Viewed from above, the man-made pond looks much darker than the nearby waters of the Chesapeake Bay. That’s because it drops 150 feet to a flat bottom, where, out of view of the public, the military tests missiles, torpedoes, sonar and the effects of explosions on submarines and boats — all within walls that can withstand the equivalent of 4,100 pounds of TNT.

It’s also where Navy divers practice salvage missions. When the military isn’t blowing things up in the Super Pond, it offers a controlled and easy-to-monitor environment, away from the unpredictability of nature’s choppy waves and ever-shifting conditions.

“Until recently,” said Maj. Gen. Genaro J. Dellarocco, chief of the Army Test and Evaluation Command, “it was one of the safest facilities we had on the installation.

“We’re investigating with the Navy to find out what changed.”

On Feb. 26, rescue workers pulled two members of the Navy’s elite Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit 2 from the Super Pond.

Diver First Class James Reyher, 28, and Diver Second Class Ryan Harris, 23 — whose unit has been involved in high-profile missions such as the recovery of the space shuttle Challenger — had been participating in a training exercise at the facility. They were reportedly using air hoses supplied from the surface, and were tethered together.

One was dead at the scene; the other was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital. They were the second and third divers to die at the Super Pond in less than a month.
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