BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) – A worker at an incinerator that destroys chemical weapons for the Army died of an apparent heart attack he suffered while working, a coroner said Thursday.

There was no indication that Roderick Traylor’s death had anything to do with nerve agents, Calhoun County Coroner Pat Brown said. Traylor, 45, experienced breathing difficulties in a car Wednesday outside the Anniston Army Depot, where a chemical weapons incinerator is located.

The car’s driver pulled over at a depot entrance and officers called an ambulance, but Traylor was pronounced dead.

“It has all the appearances that it’s going to be a natural death, but it’s still under investigation,” the coroner said.

Traylor was a subcontractor for Westinghouse Anniston, which operates the incinerator. He worked for Columbus, Ohio-based Battelle, a nonprofit independent research and development organization.

The company didn’t immediately respond to a telephone message seeking comment.

Brown said the men were off the post checking a security perimeter, but he was unsure exactly what they were doing when Traylor was stricken.

Brown said he was frustrated the Army and Westinghouse Anniston refused to release details of the death. He said the secrecy only lessened trust among the nearly 40,000 residents who live near the incinerator, located in east Alabama about 50 miles east of Birmingham.

“That’s why I’m doing an autopsy. The way they do things makes it look like a big cover-up, and it’s really not that big,” he said.

Army spokesman Mike Abrams declined to comment other than to say the death wasn’t caused by an industrial accident or linked to chemical weapons. Westinghouse Anniston spokesman Terry Sholin said it would not release information “out of respect to the family.”

The Army hasn’t reported any deaths at the incinerator since it began operations nearly five years ago. The Army reports only one previous death in 18 years at seven chemical weapons destruction sites. A man died in an accident at the now-closed Johnston Atoll incinerator in the South Pacific, but the death was not linked to chemical agents.

AP-ES-06-12-08 1514EDT