By Bob Downing Beacon Journal staff writer There's a new challenge at the old Ravenna Arsenal in Portage County: three potentially live 500-pound bombs. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has awarded a $350,000 contract to a Texas company to dig around the bombs to determine whether they have fuses and must be detonated, or whether they are lacking fuses and can be moved safely, said Mark Patterson, facility manager at the Ravenna Army Ammunition Plant. The bombs are ''the biggest thing we've encountered yet out here,'' he said. The work by PIKA International of Stafford will begin next week and be completed by Aug. 28. The three bombs were found in the 35-acre Open Demolition Area No. 2 near the center of the complex that lies in eastern Portage and western Trumbull counties, Patterson said. The bombs appear to date to the late 1940s or early 1950s and probably were produced at the old arsenal, he said. The bombs, each containing as much as 270 pounds of high explosives, are partially buried and sitting along Sand Creek at the so-called half-acre Rocket Ridge area, he said. Each bomb would have two fuses set in fuse wells, but officials cannot tell if the bombs are fused or not, he said. If the bombs are fused, the Army probably will attempt to explode them on site. That would require a new contract with an engineering firm, Patterson said. The Army has exploded bombs that size in the past at the old arsenal, and there is little danger of bomb fragments leaving the site, he said. If the bombs are not fused, they will be moved into storage and dealt with later, he said. It is possible that they are filled with sand or other non-explosive materials, he said. In addition, an artillery shell with a fuse has been uncovered nearby and will have to be exploded surrounded by sandbags, he said. The current contract also calls for a full assessment of what's in the old dump with up to 5 feet of buried wastes. The site, discovered in 2004, is about 90 feet long and 80 feet wide. In 2007, a white phosphorus grenade exploded at Rocket Ridge. Some ammunition had also washed into Sand Creek. A screening mechanism was installed last summer to keep munitions from washing farther downstream. The Ravenna complex produced artillery and mortar shells in World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. It closed in 1971. Most of the 21,419-acre facility has been turned over to the Ohio Army National Guard for use as a training complex. Bob Downing can be reached at 330-996-3745 or bdowning@thebeaconjournal.com.