WEBSTER PARISH, LA (KSLA) -
Residents of Doyline will be asked to get out of town Friday evening and be prepared to stay away through the weekend, while hundreds of thousands of pounds of explosives are moved and secured at Camp Minden.
Col. Mike Edmonson, head of the Louisiana State Police, says that an estimated 1 million pounds of explosives are spread out around the northwest Louisiana site leased by Explo Systems, Inc.
The area is near a local high school, the parish prison and the town of Doyline, which has about 800 residents.
Webster Parish Sheriff Gary Sexton says the improperly stored product will not be touched until Saturday morning. Sexton says it's not known how long it will take to move the material, but school in Doyline will also be closed on Monday in order to give parents time make alternative arrangements.
Sexton says the evacuations will affect all residents inside Doyline city limits and are "not mandatory but highly recommended."
A Louisiana State Police hazmat team has developed a site safety plan that will be executed in three phases. First, they'll facilitate the transportation of over 1 million pounds of the smokeless black powder known as M6 to a customer in Arkansas.
They say that will make room for moving the improperly stored material into magazines appropriate for containing the product. Next, they'll assess how much space is in the 80 magazines on the site to determine how much space there is to store the material. Finally, they say they will "break down" the size of the improperly stored site into smaller sites.
LA 163 will be closed at Amos Cut Off south of the Doyline city limits. LA 164 will be closed from the Bossier/Webster line to US 371 in Sibley. Once they leave, residents will not be allowed back in until the project is completed.
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