The Black Powder Panic

In a famous scene from "Casablanca", Claude Raines as the Chief of Police, is ordered by the occupying Nazis to close Rick's Cafe.  Just prior to being handed his winnings, he exclaims - very tongue in cheek and in that elegant, edgy accent -  the following:

"I'm shocked - shocked! - to discover gambling is going on in this establishment!"

In the wake of three explosions - two last month and one as long ago as June, 2011 - the EPA, ATF and our local parish sheriff's department have suddenly uncovered a million pounds of black powder being improperly stored at  an army ammunition depot turned National Guard facility not far from the city.   They are, so they say, shocked, stunned and dismayed at this discovery.  The danger to life and limb is unclear but as a precaution, an evacuation has been urgently recommended although not made mandatory while the explosives are moved from their current home - cardboard boxes on wooden pallets out in the woods - to secure bunkers in an undisclosed location.  

Judging by the extent and the doomsday tone of the news coverage, you might think that a hidden cache of nuclear weapons and radioactive waste had been discovered next to a schoolyard and that authorities had acted within nanoseconds to protect the public.  You might even think that the existence of the explosives had gone undetected for the last several decades - that it had been a well guarded secret, an intentional cover up by a greedy, danger be damned, profit minded company.  You might even think that no one who could've done anything to correct it ever had a glimmer of the danger, that everyone except the offending storage company was innocent as newfallen snow.  Yep, you might think that.

So the hazmat teams suit up and the trucks roll, businesses reluctantly close their doors and anxious families pack up and leave.  How exactly, I wonder, do you go about moving a million pounds of explosives, where do you take it in a weekend's time and who pays for the lost revenue, the upset lives and the frightened children.

A cynic might be suspicious but personally I'm shocked - shocked! - to finally have all this come to light.  A million pounds of black powder concealed in plain sight for over 60 years and no one - well, except for the locals and the guards and the hunters and businessmen and the National Guardsmen and the newspapers and the military - no one knew.    

Wonder what whoever wrote that line for Claude Raines must be thinking.