Skeleton Site Gets Reprieve

Bowing to congressional pressure, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers suspended work Tuesday on a project to bury the site where the 9,200-year-old Kennewick Man skeleton was found.

The announcement came as the U.S. House approved an amendment barring the corps from carrying out plans to cover the Columbia River shoreline near Kennewick where the ancient skeleton was found in 1996.

The corps and Indian tribes contended that dirt, rocks and plants should be dumped on the site where they were found to prevent water erosion and to protect any additional bones from scavengers.

A group of scientists filed a lawsuit in Portland to gain the right to study the ancient skeleton - which the area’s Indian tribes claim as an ancestor - and the area where it was found. The scientists contend they will not be able to study the site if the corps goes through with its plan to cover the shoreline.

Bills introduced by Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., and Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., prohibit the corps from stabilizing, covering or permanently altering the site without permission from the federal judge hearing the scientists’ lawsuit.

In a related matter, Jim Chatters, the Richland archaeologist who initially studied the bones, said Monday infection from a spear point wound likely contributed substantially to Kennewick Man’s death.