From the CBS story at http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57339029/274-soldiers-ashes-dumped-in-va-landfill/
This week, after The Post pressed for information contained in the Dover mortuary's electronic database, the Air Force produced a tally based on those records. It showed that 976 fragments from 274 military personnel were cremated, incinerated and taken to the landfill between 2004 and 2008.
An additional group of 1,762 unidentified remains were collected from the battlefield and disposed of in the same manner, the Air Force said. Those fragments could not undergo DNA testing because they had been badly burned or damaged in explosions. The total number of incinerated fragments dumped in the landfill exceeded 2,700.
There is a difference between sanitary waste and biohazardous waste. For example, in an operating room, if an appendage is cut off due to gangrene or other physical cause, the remains may not be treated as sanitary waste, but must be disposed of as biohazardous waste. Generally they are incinerated with procedures to document their proper disposal.
Blood and excretia from funeral mortuaries are disposed in compliance with OSHA regulations 29 CFR 1910.1030.
Biohazard disposal is generally regulated at the State level, but operations aboard military facilities might not always be state supervised or inspected.
Other issues arise regarding the permitting of the landfill. Generally explicit measures are taken at landfills regarding biohazardous waste. Additionally, full human corpses are not legitimately allowed in landfills.
Since cremated remains of servicemen already have provisions for burial, it seems bureaucratically it would be more cumbersome to dispose of the remains at a landfill than through mortuary services.
From the CBS report, it appears there were a large accumulation of human remains, which were body parts, blown apart in war, set aside to DNA test to identify the remains, but then discovered some percentage were no longer so identifiable by those procedures with certainty. The volume of such human parts accumulated to the point that they then were disposed of as bio-hazardous waste.
Once incinerated, as opposed to cremated, they were then disposed of as bio-hazardous waste vice human ashes from a crematorium.
It's a tough call.
For most situations, had the body parts been identified or even suggested as to their original identities, the surviving family members had probably already gone through a funeral and grieving period. Ressurrecting the disposal of remains would likely cause more grief than resolution with loved ones.
Meanwhile, if a family member simply isn't accepting the death and proper dedication to handling the situation, I suspect no amount of due diligence nor responsible action of those associated with it would escape accusation and angst from the family member as a substitute for their grief.
I appreciate your comments. My take on it would be that it would be respectful to place these body parts in a common form of a repository on hallowed ground, with the explanation for why it was done to be documented for public review.
I would also respect these remains being burring at sea with full honors. I do lean toward the land based resolution, because I think it would be edifying for people to be able to see how much we cared even for the remnants of those lost.
Thanks for the response.