History
Located on 750 acres of waterfront property in Middle River, Md., the Glenn L. Martin State Airport is operated as a general aviation facility by the Maryland Aviation Administration (MAA) and is the operations home for the Maryland Air National Guard.
The property, purchased by the State of Maryland from the Martin Marietta Corporation in 1975, had been part of a larger site acquired by Glenn L. Martin, an early pioneer in aircraft manufacturing. For many years the facility served as an airport for military planes produced at the adjacent Martin assembly plants.
Investigation
Investigation of four specific areas at the airport began after bits of crushed, buried drums were discovered along a taxiway median in 1991.
Lockheed Martin became involved when debris uncovered at the site suggested a link between the heritage company and the areas being probed.
As the former site owner and a conscientious corporate citizen, Lockheed Martin took samples and conducted tests to evaluate the nature and extent of the contamination in site soils and airport pond sediments.
The investigation found the presence of
- volatile organic compounds (commonly used solvents and degreasers) in the groundwater
- certain metals (such as cadmium)
- polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs; by-products of asphalt, burning, etc.)
Today
In the interest of expediting site cleanup, Lockheed Martin is evaluating various remedial alternatives in parallel with the site investigation to be ready to implement a remedy when the investigation is complete.
The Corporation is committed to continuing its work with Maryland Department of the Environment and the MAA to develop a cleanup strategy.
For more information view the Fact Sheet Fall 2021.