The Department of National Defence is getting ready to begin the third and final phase of a decades-long cleanup of land contaminated by diesel fuel on a former military base along the edge of the St-Lawrence River.

According to the project manager in charge of the job, the department is now "conscious" and "sensitive" to the fact local Innu people used that land for a long time before DND ever set up the radar base there.

However, it could be too late to salvage any artifacts.

Land disturbed since 1950s

Bernard Michaud has been working on the CFS Moisie cleanup since 2011. He said DND discovered the diesel contamination 16 years after it sold part of the base's land to a private numbered company.

The diesel oil had leached into the ground around a pipe which linked two huge diesel reservoirs to the power and heating systems on the base.

Michaud said the department will hire someone to be on the site during the excavation work to keep an eye out for artifacts. But he said it's likely much of the land was disturbed during the construction of the base in the 1950s.

"I would say the chance that artifacts have been removed is probably bigger during the operation of the radar station than after the closing or shutdown of the radar station," said Michaud. "The sub-surface has been transformed and removed."

The contaminated soil was excavated and decontaminated in 2006 and 2007, to a depth of four metres. Michaud said there are another 10-thousand cubic metres of soil further down left to be restored.

"The tricky aspect about that project is that the contaminated soil is deep underground," said Michaud. "The groundwater is 10-metres deep underground, and the contaminated soil is between four metres underground, down to that groundwater."

A brief history of the Moisie radar station:

1945: DND starts buying parcels of land on Moisie Point.

1953: RCAF Moisie radar station opens.

1988: DND shuts down the base, then called CFS Moisie​.

​1989: DND sells part of the base to a private numbered company.

2005: contamination discovered during removal of underground DND equipment.

2006-2007: Phase 1 of cleanup: surface soil up to 4 metres underground excavated.

2011-2014: Phase 2 of cleanup: hundreds of litres of oil floating above groundwater pumped out.

2016: Final phase of cleanup: decontamination of soil down to the groundwater level.

(Information from DND)

Michaud met Innu band leaders at a community meeting in Uashat–​Maliotenam last Tuesday.

"The objective of this meeting was to explain what kind of work the Department of National Defence wanted to do," Michaud said, "and to understand and listen to their preoccupations or their questions."

He says DND officials wanted to speak to people in the community to find out how the project could "evolve."

The director of territorial rights and protection for the Uashat-Maliotenam First Nation, Jean-Claude Therrien Pinette, called that meeting a good first step, following a bad start.

The Uashat-Maliotenam First Nation has what it believes to be an Armed Forces map of Moisie village, in an area the Innu say they used as a summer village for 'thousands of years.' (Submitted by Raoul Jobin)

Therrien Pinette said last week Innu leaders were shocked to find out about the decontamination only weeks before the work is supposed to start.

He said it now appears DND is keeping an "open mind."

"They will include different strategies to address our concerns, but we have more than that we want to talk about," he said. "For example, the base was sold in 1989 during the Mulroney era: We have many concerns about what happened."

Therrien Pinette also said the band is in contact with a local archaeological organization, Archeo-Mamu, for their expertise.

He said the band will also be writing to Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan to discuss how part of the base was sold without consulting Innu leaders.

Therrien Pinette said local leaders have not decided yet if they'll request a delay in the decontamination. The work is set to begin at the end of the month.

"We will write to the minister about how they (the department) will work with us and our traditional occupation" of that land, he said.