I’d be surprised if “inerting” the material did not involve anything more than directly treating it in some more benign way. Some chemical treatment? There may be one or two employees at work who can give us an answer, although there’s nothing re solids going on at any of our sites. I’ll ask anyway. At worst, more bootless yet entertaining theorizing would boil up.
BTW: Things to Consider before de-coring a solid-fuel rocket (although in the following case, two scientists were illegally burning experimental high-energy propellant. I worked at Rocketdyne at the time). On 26 July 1994, two scientists, Otto K. Heiney and Larry A. Pugh were killed when the chemicals they were illegally burning in open pits exploded. After a grand jury investigation and FBI raid on the facility, three Rocketdyne officials pleaded guilty in June 2004 to illegally storing explosive materials.
This turns out to be a much more interesting subject than I thought it would. Another rabbit hole to go down into. If and when I find the time.
Anyway, for now I’ve found a handbook from 1972:
And while it mentions “phlegmatizing” liquid components with other chemicals, the prescribed method(s) for anything solid boils down to “burn it”. Either akin to a static test if the motor is still intact, and everything else goes into a burn pit. Splitting a motor casing open first with an explosive charge if needs be. Deep sea disposal would also be an option. You’ve just gotta admire the military’s robust approach to matters like this.
(This is from half a century ago now; they might have upgraded the procedures somewhat by now.)
Fun fact:
In 1966, 75% of the stockpiled Y2 warheads1) (as used for the Polaris missile) were thought to be defective and unusable due to a design flaw.
1) A variant of the W47 thermonuclear warhead developed by the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory. Apparently one of the safety devices that guarded against the warhead accidentally going critical (by soaking up free neutrons) tended to degrade in a way that made it impossible to remove this safety under combat condition. Arguably meeting the objective that nuclear weapons should always fail safe.
Maybe it’s me, but it’s odd to see so many people excited about merging their virtual and actual reality. A person in Times Square doing a bunch of stuff on their computer isn’t really fully engaged with either one. Moving (or noticing/interacting with surroundings or people) stops the computer work or entertainment. One must stop moving and focus on the virtual inputs to type for navigating screens or texting. Ok, it’s on the user’s face and has built-in safety features to prevent what people are doing on smartphones…
