Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) Background
  • UXO is an acronym for ‘UneXploded Ordnance’
  • A UXO can be defined as a munition, weapon delivery system, or ordnance item that contains explosives, propellants, and chemical agents that have not been detonated or still present a hazard when handled. They occur on or near the ground surface and can detonate when disturbed accidentally.
  • Pictures of ordnance & scrap metal
  • Forward modeling magnetic response of UXO
Types of ordnance
  • Small arms munitions
  • Hand grenades
  • Rockets
  • Guided missiles
  • Projectiles
  • Mortars
  • Projected grenades
  • Rifle grenades
  • Submunitions
  • Bombs
Environmental Impact of UXO

Military munition ranges found on many military bases in the United States and in other countries are contaminated with UXO. As part of the 20th century growth of the United States military, military munitions ranges have become large in number and increasingly contaminated with UXO. The relatively recent downsizing of the military, has closed many military bases. The most costly problem of turning this land over to the public is due to UXO contamination. In addition, UXO poses a significant hazard to public safety in many parts of the world, and include armed conflicts in numerous regions throughout the globe.

Geophysical methods, especially electromagnetic induction and magnetics, have proven to be important tools in UXO clearance because of their effectiveness in detecting the presence of buried metallic objects from surveys conducted on the surface. It remains a great challenge, however, to discriminate between UXO and benign objects such as fragments and waste metals. Increased discrimination capability will reduce the false alarm rate and ultimately decrease the cost of remediation.

Defense Science Board Task Force Recommendations

The Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Unexploded Ordnance from November, 2003 may be downloaded from the following site, http://www.acq.osd.mil/dsb/reports/uxo.pdf

The report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Unexploded Ordnance from November, 2003 states that the UXO cleanup problem is a very large-scale undertaking involving 10 million acres of land at some 1400 sites. The estimated cost of cleanup of current UXOs is tens of billions of dollars.

Two overall problems and recommendations:

1) The lack of reliable data sets on past munition use at cleanup sites.

2) Instruments that are used to detect buried UXO also detect scrap metal objects and other non-UXO objects, which are extremely costly to dig up.

In the role of geophysicists we consider the task force's recommendation for problem 2. They recommend the use of more advanced technology instruments that exploit modern digital processing and advanced multi-mode sensors to achieve and improved level of discrimination of scrap from UXOs.

Useful UXO Links

Back to UXO Research Group Page
CSM Course in UXO