In lawsuits filed nationwide, seeking class-action status, current and former soldiers allege that KBR's "burn pits" on bases in Iraq and Afghanistan contain dioxin, asbestos and human corpses.
Reading like a postmodern version of Jonathan Swift's "Description of a City Shower," the catalog of rubbish in the pits includes:
"Tires, lithium batteries, Styrofoam, paper, wood, rubber, petroleum-oil-lubricating products, metals, hydraulic fluids, munitions boxes, medical waste, biohazard materials (including human corpses), medical supplies (including those used during smallpox inoculations), paints, solvents, asbestos insulation, items containing pesticides, polyvinyl chloride pipes, animal carcasses, dangerous chemicals, and hundreds of thousands of plastic water bottles."
"Flames shoot hundreds of feet into the sky" as the huge pits are set ablaze, the Nashville lawsuit claims.