Columbus Naval Air Station was located in Franklin County approximately 6 miles east/northeast of downtown Columbus. The former Navy Station was located at the east end of the current Port Columbus Airport. The site lies to the south of Big Walnut Creek. The Navy acquired the property for the air station in 1942 and occupied the facility until 1946, when the property was accessed. To date, three potential areas of environmental concern have been identified at the site: fire training area/dump, tank farm area consisting of underground storage tanks (USTs), and the Navy steam plant USTs. The former fire training area/dump was operated by the Naval Air Station in the vicinity of former Navy barracks. Very limited information remains regarding the fire training area/dump site. Apparently, Naval military records concerning this disposal area were destroyed. Funding has been requested by the Army Corps of Engineers to complete a limited scope site investigation of this area. The tank farm area is another identified area of potential contamination. In this area, the Navy installed 7 USTs for fueling operations. In the 1960's, the tanks were abandoned in place in by filling them with sand and removing all pumping and filter equipment. Based on information from the Army Corps of Engineers, funding has been requested to remove the tanks and soils from this site. The last area of concern is the Navy Steam Plant USTs. However, the exact location of the tanks is unknown.

A Phase II environmental audit, completed by Metcalf & Eddy for Port Columbus in 1991, identified and investigated the three previously mentioned areas of concern. Soil borings were completed in the identified areas to define subsurface soils and identify potential contamination. Soil sample analysis was limited to field screening with a photoionization detector (PID) and lab analysis for Total Petroleum Hydrocarbons (TPH)(except one sample was analyzed for TPH, VOCs and metals). PID readings ranged from 0 to >2000 ppm and TPH concentrations ranged from 20-810 ppm between all three areas.

The Department of Defense (DoD) is evaluating if existing data justifies further investigations at the site.