Biological weapons project manager of the Ukrainian branch of the Black & Veatch office, and the main contact person for Ukraine’s defense and health ministry officials, especially Ulana Suprun. In August 2021, he told the Kansas City Business Journal that his work on airborne biological agents in Ukraine had helped Black & Veatch to develop a device for purifying air of SARS-CoV-2 virus particles, the virus that causes COVID-19. Lippencott is a graduate of the US Army Military Academy at West Point.
The company has worked for the Pentagon since 2008 under projects for studying potentially hazardous bioagents, including project UP-1 for studying rickettsia and tick-borne encephalitis virus in arthropods in northwestern Ukraine. For the purpose of global control of the biological situation in the course of the UP-2 project the company introduced a system of remote monitoring of tularemia and anthrax at Ukrainian bio-facilities.
Black and Veatch’s activities in Ukraine aroused many questions, even from Ukrainian special services. In particular, the Kherson office of the Ukrainian security service SBU back in 2017 noted growing potential risks of a worsening in the epidemiological situation due to the DTRA’s intention to use the Black and Veatch company to establish control of Ukrainian laboratories studying the pathogens of particularly dangerous infections.
