cleanup · Niagara County
Lake Ontario Ordnance Works (LOOW)
Lewiston and Porter
Former 7,567-acre World War II ordnance complex built for flaked-TNT production. Manufacturing lasted about nine months in 1943, and process wastes were disposed of on site; the Army Corps continues the FUDS decision process for investigated drainage features.
The documented story
What happened here?
The federal government acquired the 7,567-acre Lake Ontario Ordnance Works property between 1941 and 1944. Six TNT lines and facilities for acid mixing, recovery, purification, and concentration were concentrated within an approximately 2,500-acre developed area.
LOOW is a Formerly Used Defense Site with many present-day owners. The overview pin represents the historic federal footprint, not a claim that every current parcel was used for TNT production or waste disposal.
War production redrew a farming landscape
Families, orchards, and wartime workers came before the LOOW cleanup map
7,567 acresthe documented former defense-site footprint
1941-1942
The federal government assembled a defense landscape from private land
The War Department acquired a large tract occupied largely by farm and orchard families. Local historical records describe 149 landowners facing rapid displacement while houses, barns, fields, and roads gave way to the ordnance works and its protective buffer.
1942-1943
Thousands built a plant that produced TNT for nine months
Six TNT production lines and supporting acid, recovery, utility, rail, drainage, housing, and waste systems were constructed across the site. The Army Corps reports that production ended in 1943 when other defense plants had created excess TNT capacity.
After World War II
One wartime property became many later properties and programs
Most of the acreage was transferred or sold, while portions entered Atomic Energy Commission use and the Niagara Falls Storage Site story. Today governments, businesses, residents, and cleanup programs occupy pieces of the former footprint, so LOOW is a historical umbrella rather than a single present-day contamination boundary.
News record
Major news events
Coverage selected here marks a turning point in public awareness, policy, enforcement, employment, or cleanup. Links open at the original publisher or archive; WNYAtlas does not reproduce restricted articles or images.
A vast wartime TNT complex operates for only about nine months
The short production period left a much longer land-use and investigation history across thousands of acres, including process areas, disposal locations, utilities, and drainage features later divided among many owners.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ↗Niagara County organizes a community review of decades of overlapping investigations
The Community LOOW Project assembled federal, state, local, and public records so residents could distinguish the former TNT works, the Niagara Falls Storage Site, commercial waste operations, schools, farms, homes, and other present-day properties.
Niagara County Department of Health ↗The Army Corps takes public comment on three investigated drainage features
The proposed no-further-action finding is limited to the 30-inch outfall, Six Mile Creek, and Southwest Drainage Ditch; it is not a blanket finding for every property or every separate cleanup program inside the historic LOOW footprint.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Buffalo District ↗Chronology
Timeline
- 1941-1943
The government acquired and built a contractor-operated flaked-TNT manufacturing complex.
- 1943
LOOW produced TNT for about nine months before decommissioning because other federal plants had excess production capacity.
- 1989-2008
Federal remedial investigations examined the former works, including disposal areas, drainage features, and underground utility lines.
- 2021
A risk reevaluation supported a proposed no-further-action approach for the 30-inch outfall, Six Mile Creek, and the Southwest Drainage Ditch.
- 2025-2027
The Army Corps sought public comment on that proposal and scheduled a final decision document for 2027.
Environmental record
Documented impacts
- The Army Corps states that TNT manufacturing and on-site process-waste disposal potentially affected the former works.
- For the three drainage features in the current proposed plan, the federal evaluation reported results below applicable background or screening levels or calculated risk thresholds.
- Those findings apply to the named drainage features; they are not a blanket determination for every parcel or every separate cleanup program inside the historic LOOW boundary.
Response
Cleanup and controls
- The Army Corps investigated Six Mile Creek, the Southwest Drainage Ditch, the 30-inch outfall, and former utility corridors under the FUDS program.
- No further action for the three drainage features remains a proposed decision until the final decision document is issued.
Then and now
The site today
Local and federal governments, businesses, and private residents now own land within the former footprint. Property-specific conclusions require the corresponding federal, state, or local record.