An anonymous phone call about a railroad car containing a leaking nerve agent canister led the FBI, the Federal Railroad Administration and the Lebanon Police Department to a Lebanon rail yard the morning of Jan. 22.

The canister turned out to be 200, 2,000-pound bomb casings lost two years ago after being shipped from Garland, Texas, to the McAlester Army Ammunition Plant in McAlester, Okla. The casings did not contain explosives or fusing devices.

Lebanon Police Depart-ment Sgt. Det. Kevin Martinez said he accompanied an FBI agent who had received a phone tip about possible nerve agent to Franklin's business off Industrial Way.

"Our involvement consisted of basically an assistant to the FBI," he said.

Federal Railroad Adminis-tration officials were already at the Franklin yard and had determined the bomb casings were not dangerous when he and the FBI agent arrived, Martinez said.

FBI spokeswoman Beth Steele said the casings never contained any hazardous residue.

"We take all calls about dangerous or hazardous threats very seriously," she said.

The Lebanon Express received a call around 9 a.m. Tuesday from a male who did not identify himself, saying there was a railcar of hazardous materials, including a canister that was leaking nerve gas, that Rick Franklin Corp. was trying to smuggle through Lebanon.

Amused employees of Rick Franklin Corp. couldn't understand what all the fuss was about as law enforcement, federal railroad officials and the media converged on the business that scraps old rail cars. After all, the bomb casings had been sitting in Franklin's yard behind Lebanon Samaritan Community hospital for nearly a month.

"A Union Pacific boxcar came in last month to be dismantled and when it was opened they found them," said David Farrel, general manager of the Albany & Eastern Railroad Company, also owned by Rick Franklin.

"The boys were pretty surprised. It's not every day you see empty bomb casings," Farrell said.

The boxcar became lost somewhere in the Union Pacific's vast rail network about two years ago when the waybill (shipping instructions) fell off, Farrell said. He speculated that the car had been sitting on a track somewhere waiting to be scrapped all this time.

Rick Franklin Corp. contacted the Union Pacific Railroad upon discovering the empty bomb casings. The railroad was able to trace the original waybill and confirm that the shipment presented no hazard.

The Union Pacific contracted Rick Franklin Corp. to transfer the casings to another boxcar, which was done on Jan. 16.

"Unfortunately, due to homeland security issues, we can't comment on the situation," said a Union Pacific spokesperson when contacted for a comment on the incident.

McAlester Army Ammunition Plant Public Affairs Specialist Mark Hughes said the plant receives empty bomb bodies from General Dynamic's OTS plant in Garland, Texas, and fills them with high explosives.

"I'm not aware of 200 missing bomb casings, but I'll definitely check into it," he said when asked about the Lebanon bombs. "We have no record of that shipment ever being here."

The bomb casings left Lebanon on Jan. 23 for the McAlester plant.