Cliff Armstrong is one of the many military family members suffering from illnesses or cancers linked to contaminated water at Camp Lejeune. Well water that families used to cook food, drink, bathe and fill up kiddie pools for swimming was contaminated with two probable carcinogens and one known carcinogen at levels far exceeding safety limits.
For possibly the first time, a federal court is allowing one family member to proceed with a personal injury claim against the Marine Corps due to her non-Hodgkin's lymphoma claimed to be caused by the contaminated water.
A Congressional investigation of a possible cover-up is now underway to determine who knew what and when they knew it. While families used the contaminated water supply for decades, the Bush White House also played a key role in delaying limiting public exposure to one of the contaminants.
Rep. Brad Miller (D-N.C.) is investigating a potental cover-up:
"The most recent documents suggest that maybe they did know and they actively concealed it," Miller said. "We need to know who knew about the contamination and when."
Two days ago, Congressional investigators "requested detailed documents from Navy Secretary Ray Mabus and a private contractor that was involved in the testing and cleanup of contaminated water at Camp Lejeune, N.C., over the past two decades." Questions include:
[W]hy a federal agency charged with understanding the health impacts of the contamination didn't realize until recently that benzene - a fuel solvent known to cause cancer in humans - was among the substances found in drinking water at Camp Lejeune.
"We want to know what did (the Navy and the Marine Corps) know about the water, when did they know and what did they do about it," Miller said in an interview.
"Did they know about it during the 30 years when Marines and families were exposed to the water?" Miller asked. "Did they know about it and not do anything to stop it?"
The Contaminated Water Supply
As many as 1 million people might have been exposed to the toxic water containing "trichloroethylene (TCE), tetrachloroethylene (PCE), benzene and vinyl chloride" that was dumped, leaked or buried by the main water well. The government describes TCE and PCE as "probable carcinogens" and benzene is a known carcinogen.
The US Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry "found levels of PCE as high as 200 parts per billion, compared with the 5 parts per billion that federal regulators in 1992 would set as the maximum allowable level." Government studies showed that some of the chemical concentration levels were 240 times the safe level determined by the EPA. The EPA listed Camp Lejeune as a Superfund site due to this contamination.
The Marine Corps maintains that "science has yet to show a link between Camp Lejeune's water and families' illnesses. A report by the National Research Council released last summer found no definitive cause." Yet, documents "reviewed by McClatchy indicate that there were repeated warnings about the poisonous water before the wells were shut down in late 1984."
But, no one warned the families about the toxic water. Even after a 2007 law mandated the Marine Corps to warn families of the "potential danger," many never received a warning. Paul Akers, 64, found out when he was at his oncologist's office and his daughter handed him a magazine that included a half-page ad from the Marine Corps to inform former residents about the contaminated water.
Akers grew up on the base, "splashing in a plastic kiddie pool with his little sister, cooling off in the sweltering Carolina summers." Mr. Akers' mother, a Marine's wife, died in 1960. His little sister died of cancer in June. And Akers has non-Hodgkins' lymphoma.
No warnings, yet Camp Lejeune officials "knew about the contaminants since 1980, according to a federal Government Accountability Office report, but they moved slowly to shut down affected water systems."
The Benzene Cover-Up
News of the contaminated water wells was first reported in a base newspaper and then a local newspaper 25 years ago. The contamination was initially blamed on volatile organic solvents linked to a dry cleaner.
A year ago, it was determined that the water was contaminated with benzene, a carcinogenic component of fuel. Last month, McClatchy determined from documents that 800,000 gallons of fuel had been spilled close to the main water well from the base's fuel storage farm over the years, but only 500,000 gallons recovered, leaving 300,000 gallons potentially in the well water system. For years, the Marine Corps knew the fuel farm was leaking 1,500 gallons a month but did nothing to stop the leaking, according to a memorandum written by a Camp Lejeune lawyer. The McClatchy review also showed that "a water well contaminated by leaking fuel was left functioning for at least five months after a sampling discovered it was tainted with benzene in 1984."
The Associated Press found that the benzene contamination of water wells was underreported and then omitted from a federal health review by an environmental contractor.
In July 1984, scientists found and reported that benzene was in well water samples near a base fuel farm at levels of 380 parts per billion, which far exceeds the safety limit of 5 parts per billion. In 1991, the Navy was again warned about the health hazards from such high levels of benzene. In 1992, a contractor prepared a draft report that changed the level of benzene from 380 parts per billion to 38 parts per billion, and then the final report simply did not mention the benzene. One could argue the changed numbers were merely an accidental typing error. But, when this error is combined with the exclusion of any benzene test results from the final report, some might interpret as a deliberate omission. Even 38 parts per billion is higher than the safety limit of 5 parts per billion. There is also the smell of the document dump that unethical lawyers sometimes try to bury information while complying with discovery requests as "discrepancies in the reports were tucked inside thousands of documents the Marines released last year to the Agency for Toxic Substances as part of the Marines' long-running review of water supplied to Camp Lejeune's main family housing areas."
The effect was to hide from the public one link between the contaminated water and illnesses/deaths:
Benzene, a carcinogen, is a natural part of crude oil and gasoline. Drinking water containing high levels of it can cause vomiting, dizziness, sleepiness, convulsions, and death and long-term exposure damages bone marrow, lowers red blood cells and can cause anemia and leukemia, according to the EPA.
In fact, at a 1988 meeting, the issue of the benzene contamination was discussed with federal, state and Lejeune environmental officials: A contractor described the water as so toxic that "you don't want to touch that water."
The Bush Administration TCE Delay
Recent news reports focus on benzene, but there are also questions about the TCE contamination at Camp Lejeune that I wrote about in 2007. After "massive underground plumes" of TCE were "discovered in the nation's water supplies," senior EPA scientists conducted a 4-year study and issued a preliminary risk assessment in 2001 that TCE was 2 to 40 times more likely to cause cancer than previously believed. In the mid-1980s, it was "first classified as a probable carcinogen."
Instead of imposing tough standards to limit public exposure to TCE, the EPA battled the Pentagon, Energy Dept. and NASA which appealed directly to the Bush White House for protection because each agency had contaminated sites. It was a battle of the military manufacturing "unwarranted scientific doubt" to delay and reduce protections.
A key role in delay was played by the White House's anti-EPA "working group" which included officials from Pentagon, Energy Dept. and NASA and was "co-chaired by officials in the Office of Management and Budget and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy." This working group fought the TCE risk assessment by deciding that the National Academy of Sciences should conduct another study after White House staff and the EPA briefed it on "how to evaluate TCE."
The Pentagon demanded more proof that TCE causes cancer even though 6 state, federal and international agencies classified TCE as a "probable carcinogen" and California classified as a "known carcinogen." In the summer of 2006, the new review concluded that the EPA was correct and that "evidence on cancer and other health risks from TCE exposure has strengthened since 2001," when the EPA issued its assessment.
During these years of delay alone, more civilians and soldiers were exposed to a "World Trade Center in slow motion."