Officials and the Honolulu community gathered for the first time on Wednesday since the Hawaii Health Department conditionally agreed to the Defense Department’s unpacking plan for the Red Hill fuel tanks, which leaked and contaminated a local water supply. Revealed during the Red Hill Task Force meeting was the fact that the Navy’s unpacking process was actually already completed—something many residents weren’t aware of, thanks to the many agencies overseeing this process in radio silence. “It sounds more like the Navy telling the public what they’ve decided and what they’re going to do instead of getting public input,” said Dr. Melanie Lau, a physician and designated community representative.
The brunt of the meeting, which appeared to be hastily announced, took more than four hours to complete before the public comment period began. Throughout that time, many were critical of the Defense Department’s—and even the Health Department’s—handling of recent matters. Of particular concern was the Navy revealing that, though the 24 fuel tanks at Red Hill will be completely defueled, the military is looking into how those tanks could be reused for non-fuel purposes. The tanks themselves are nearly 80 years old and clearly have structural issues, with Honolulu Board of Water Supply Chief Engineer Ernie Lau bringing up the fuel found between one of the tank’s liners and steel following last year’s fuel spill.
Lau was applauded and cheered for his consistent community advocacy, as were the meeting’s community representatives, including Dr. Lau and Ashley Nishihara, both of whom are part of the Fuel Tank Advisory Committee (FTAC). Ahead of the meeting, the FTAC received just a handful of public comments. Dozens waited patiently to address the teams responsible for the fuel leak itself, its clean-up, and its defueling. One resident evoked Camp LeJeune, the North Carolina Marine Corps Base with historically contaminated water that has prompted multiple lawsuits. Given the military’s past behaviors addressing water crises, what hope is there for residents reliant on the aquifer serving parts of Honolulu and Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam?
Rebecca Garrison, a community organizer with Oahu Water Protectors and Shut Down Red Hill Contamination, demanded accountability during her public comments. She kicked off what the environmental groups have dubbed “One Year of Implausible Deniability: A Moment of Collective Mourning.” Garrison brought up what would be the first of 10 major lies told by the Navy that the groups want to highlight:
“In Dec. 2021, Admiral Tim Cotts stated, “We are working aggressively to try to figure out what is in the water.” Admirable Tim Cotts promised us that the Navy was working to figure out what was in the tap water making people and children sick and killing their pets. But they threw away all of their water samples and we had to wait months for test results, if they even shared them… Why hasn’t the Navy apologized to all of the families that they poisoned for throwing away all of those water samples and how do you expect the public to trust the Navy with water sample collection with such a horrible track record?”
Throughout the Defense Department’s evasive response to Garrison’s questions, community members chatting in the Zoom meeting repeatedly pleaded for the Defense Department to outright apologize, to no avail. Time and again, water protectors, community organizers, concerned citizens, experts, and even members of the task force itself demanded that the communities most heavily impacted by the Red Hill water crisis have a seat at the table. Accountability and public input are crucial if the Pentagon wants the defueling process to be a just one.
The fact that the military could not even be bothered to acknowledge that it poisoned its members and civilians is damning. Many still struggle with the health effects—both mental and physical—of drinking, bathing in, and using contaminated water. If anything, the Navy is doing a better job in turning public sentiment against all militarization than righting a substantial wrong that began long before this most recent water crisis.