Last year, Guam won before the Supreme Court of the United States in its ongoing fight to hold the United States military responsible for its part in creating and using the Ordot Dump. The case is now back before the trial court. We need to hear your memories and stories about the creation, use, and history of the Ordot Dump in Chalan Pago by the United States military. We are very interested in your memories and stories of the military’s use of Ordot after World War II, in 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, and beyond.

It is widely believed that the military began using Ordot to dispose of waste prior to World War II. After World War II, the military, including the United States Navy “SeaBees” engineers, continued to use Ordot to dump large amounts of hazardous waste, including munitions, chemicals, artillery shells, bombs, weapons, vehicles, construction debris and other materials. After years of use, the United States turned the dump over to Guam to run, but the United States may have continued to truck its own municipal or other waste to the Ordot Dump.

In 2011, the Ordot Dump shut down and the new Layon Landfill near Inahålan opened for business. Due, in part, to the toxic materials and other waste dumped by the United States at the Ordot Dump, Guam began the lengthy and expensive process of cleaning it up. Closing Ordot and opening Layon has cost our people millions of dollars. Guam asked the United States to pay its fair share, but the United States has refused to help and claims it has no responsibility to share in the costs to cleanup its waste. Because of this, Guam filed the lawsuit asking the court to require the United States to pay its fair share of the costs for the contamination it caused at Ordot, closing Ordot, and opening Layon.

The Ordot Dump was open for many years, and much of the documents relating to its creation, use, and history by the military has been lost to time. But your memories and stories will help us provide evidence in court to force the United States to accept responsibility for the military’s dumping and pay its fair share of cleaning up and closing Ordot and opening Layon.

If you have memories or know of evidence seeing the United States Military at the Ordot, seeing ordinance, jeeps or other military waste at the Ordot, or if you know of people that saw trucks or drove military waste to the Ordot for disposal, we would like to talk with you. Please reach us by phone at (671) 475-2710 or via email at [email protected]