Producer
St. Marks Powder (General Dynamics)
General Dynamics-owned smokeless powder manufacturer at St. Marks, FL (Crawfordville area); ~100% of US military small-arms propellant (5.56mm, 7.62mm, 9mm, .50 BMG); in May 2024 suspended civilian propellant shipments to prioritize US military and NATO contracts; wholly dependent on nitrocellulose from Radford AAP
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Military Small Arms Propellant (DoD/NATO — Sole US Source)
75%Commercial Small Arms Propellant (Civilian Market)
20%Government-Owned Contractor-Operated (GOCO) Structure
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Did you know2024
St. Marks Powder — operated by General Dynamics (a company that builds Virginia-class submarines and Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carriers) — is the sole or near-sole US producer of military-grade stick propellant for small arms ammunition. In May 2024, St. Marks suspended all civilian powder shipments to prioritize US military and NATO-allied nation propellant contracts. This caused an immediate crisis for the civilian handloading market: millions of American gun owners who reload their own ammunition found popular powder brands (many sourced from St. Marks) unavailable for months. The suspension exposed the single point of failure in US civilian and military propellant supply: one Florida plant operating on the edge of a wildlife refuge, with a 100% dependence on nitrocellulose from one Virginia facility (Radford AAP), is the propellant chokepoint for the entire US small arms ammunition ecosystem.
Guns.com ↗Incident2024
In May 2024, Alliant Powders (Radford AAP / St. Marks Powder) suspended all civilian reloading powder shipments to prioritize US military and NATO contracts. Commercial reloaders found shelves empty nationwide. This was a direct casualty of Ukraine war demand: US military was consuming all available smokeless powder, leaving zero capacity for the civilian market. The commercial ammunition industry — built on the same supply chain — became an indirect victim of the conflict.
AmmoLand News ↗Capacity2022
St. Marks Powder's sole nitrocellulose feedstock comes from Radford Army Ammunition Plant (RAAP) in Radford, Virginia — one of the world's largest single-site nitrocellulose production facilities, operated by BAE Systems under Army contract. Nitrocellulose is produced from cotton linters + fuming nitric acid + sulfuric acid in a highly hazardous batch process. If Radford experiences a production interruption (fire, flood, equipment failure, labor action), St. Marks propellant production stops — and within weeks, US military small arms ammunition replenishment slows. The US DoD's single-supplier dependency for nitrocellulose (Radford is the only US military-grade NC facility at scale) feeding the single-supplier propellant plant (St. Marks) creates a two-link critical path in the US military readiness supply chain for infantry ammunition.
Business Defense ↗Origin2023
St. Marks Powder in Wakulla County, Florida, is a Government-Owned Contractor-Operated (GOCO) facility that has produced smokeless propellant for the US military for decades. The plant is physically situated on the edge of the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge — a 70,000-acre Federal wildlife area — creating a unique coexistence between explosives manufacturing and conservation land. The facility was operated by Olin Corporation before transitioning to General Dynamics' Ordnance & Tactical Systems (GDOTS) division. General Dynamics operates the facility as a $46B prime defense contractor whose primary lines are nuclear-powered submarines (Electric Boat), Abrams tanks (Lima AAP), and Gulfstream business jets — yet its St. Marks unit makes the propellant powder loaded into every M855A1 5.56mm round the US military issues.
General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems ↗