Wurtsmith Air Force Base is located in Iosco County, Michigan. Arvo said theVAhas rejected his medical problems as being service-related four or five times., If you think about it rationally, (theU.S. Department of Defense) doesnt want to do a study, he said. 1:36. All rights reserved. We have 1,500 people who have been tested with elevated levels in the Portsmouth area, who are anxious about their future and their childrens future. The group is charged with focusing on the health effects of contamination, cleanup standards and performance, finding science-supported standards for exposure and cleanup, and coordinating agencies to address the problems. Visit EWG's 501(c)(4) organization, EWG Action Fund. Ian Ross, PFAS practice lead at engineering company CDM Smith, said: It was known that PFAS are extremely persistent in the environment since at least 1950 but they have been widely used in highly dispersive applications such as in firefighting foams since 1962.. Reports suggest that when the foam was washed away following training simulations, it seeped into the ground and nearby streams, contaminating the tap water base residents and locals used for drinking, bathing, cleaning and more. DoD has already spent $200 million studying and testing its water supply, and also providing either filters, alternate wells or bottled water to address contamination. Congress should also do more to alert active and retired service members and their families about their exposure to PFAS and the health risks they face as a result. In mid-September the DOD released shocking new figures that identify the scale of PFAS contamination in 95 installations from 35 states and Puerto Rico. It is not known whether wells near those sites have been contaminated. Though the compounds are highly effective, they are also linked to cancer, kidney disease, birth defects, decreased immunity, liver problems and a range of other serious diseases. So you just dont do the study., U.S.Rep.Dan Kildee, a Flint Democrat, said in a statement the new ATSDR report confirmed what many veterans serving at Wurtsmith feared that during their service they were exposed to dangerous chemicals in their drinking water., Its the Air Forces responsibility to make sure those exposed to these harmful chemicals have access to the health care they need. New Mexico's investigations of groundwater contamination near two New Mexico Air Force Bases continued as it sought to find out the scale of the pollution and risk to human health . Attorneys working with ClassAction.org are now investigating potential lawsuits on behalf of individuals who lived on military bases and were diagnosed with any of the following: Attorneys working with ClassAction.org are particularly interested in speaking with people who lived on the following bases, which are believed to have had their water contaminated with PFAS chemicals: A map of the base locations listed above can be viewed below. They never break down in nature. EWG officials noted, however, that the DoD has not only been slow to recognize the problem of PFAS, it has fought cleaning up the contamination for years. Both . Elmendorf Air Force Base water contamination may have caused health risks such as neurological disorders in veterans who served on the base and even birth defects in children. But DOD waited until 2011 to warn service members about the risks posed by PFAS. The Environmental Working Group is a nonprofit, non-partisan organization that empowers people to live healthier lives in a healthier environment. Nellis Air Force Base serves your region with drinking water that originates its water from Purchased surface water. It's going to be somewhere in that vicinity," Sullivan said. PFAS, which is an umbrella term for a group of manmade chemicals that includes perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS), are often referred to as forever chemicals. This is because PFAS hardly ever break down in the environment and can accumulate, remain and persist in the body particularly the bloodstream, liver and kidneys for decades. Twenty-four of those had drinking water contamination at levels higher than the Environmental Protection Agency's lifetime health advisory of 70 parts per trillion. "These chemicals build up. PFAS have been detected in even the remotest parts of the globe, from the Arctic to Antarctica. Kirtland Air Force Base jet fuel leak, USA A decades-old jet fuel spill contaminated soil and groundwater beneath Kirtland Air Force Base, moving towards wells supplying drinking water to Albuquerque. PFAS contaminate the blood of every American and have been linked to serious health problems, including cancer and harm to the reproductive and immune systems. In total, 401 active and former installations had at least one. But to fall foul of the worst effects of PFOS or PFOA, you would need to be exposed for a sustained period of time to pretty high concentrations of the substances. Jack Holder, a Pearl Harbor survivor who went on become a decorated World War II flyer, has died in Arizona. Exposure and digestion of the water can be harmful. In the absence of a Congressional order, they would continue to be a bad neighbor, he said. It operated throughout World War II and became a permanent installation in 1951, designated by theAir Forceas a fighter-interceptor training base for theU.S.Air Defense Command. Fifty years ago, there were only a handful of Hawaiian language speakers. This is because individuals who have fallen ill as a result of PFAS exposure have suffered significant harm that warrants the cost and time associated with filing an individual lawsuit. Toxic chemicals contaminate Cape Cod drinking water amid reports of seemingly inexplicable illnesses. 1250 I Street NW Using Freedom of Information Act requests, he said he found records of multiple firefighting foam spills. 2, which includesOscoda County, applauded the new ATSDR conclusions. PFAS chemicals have been detected in the drinking water of19 million Americans in 49 states, and unreleased EPA data show that up to110 millionpeople may have PFAS-contaminated drinking water. WASHINGTON - Drinking water supplies at two Washington state Army installations are contaminated with extremely high levels of the toxic fluorinated chemicals called PFAS, according to Department of Defense data obtained by EWG under the Freedom of Information Act. . The services are also phasing out the firefighting foam they use and working on replacements that do not contain perfluorinated compounds, Sullivan said. The National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2020 included important bipartisan reforms, including a provision to phase out AFFF by 2024. Suite 1000 The first target for the department was to address the 36 direct drinking water sources that are contaminated and cut off that human exposure as soon as possible, Sullivan said. Pregnant Air Force B-1 pilot soars to new heights, Tax scams How to report them Money Minute, Capitol Hill weighs action on two controversial topics: medical marijuana and abortion, Lockheed wins hypersonics contract | Defense Dollars, Go inside a secret nuclear fallout bunker sealed for decades, Veterans Affairs deputy secretary to leave post on April 1, US increases military support for Somalia against al-Shabab, Air Force advisers study use of satellites for tracking moving targets. In 1983, investigations had shown soil and water contamination with degreasers and JP-4 jet fuel, and in 1990 . Public interest science has only just begun to wrap its head around PFOS and PFOA, decades after they were first produced, and so there is little chance it will ever catch up with manufacturers, who can tweak an existing molecule, rename it, and have it on the market in a fraction of the time it takes to establish a body of evidence to demonstrate whether or not it needs regulating. The Maj. Richard Star Act would eliminate the dollar-for-dollar offset on retirement pay that combat-disabled vets with less Capt. Theres a hint in the shorthand for the properties of some PFAS, which is PBT: persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic. TheU.S. Environmental Protection Agencysmaximum contaminant level for TCE in drinking water, above which long-term exposure could be expected to harm health, is 5 parts per billion. Eielson AFB is located approximately 25 miles southeast of Fairbanks, Alaska. Direct exposure can also come via cosmetics, sprays or dust from consumer products, but little is known of the impacts through these pathways. The agency made presumptions about how long different groups of people may have been exposed to the tainted water supply, using conservative estimates and other governmental data: veterans for five years; off-base but nearby children from birth to age 21, and nearby adults for 33 years, and on-base employees for 25 years. Now, the community is thriving. Its estimated that, given the widespread use of PFAS and the ubiquitous presence of some of them in the environment, almost everyone on the planet has PFAS in their blood at some level. TheAgency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry(ATSDR), a federal public health agency within theU.S. Department of Health and Human Services, this week released new conclusions about the impact of Wurtsmith veterans exposures to unsafe levels of the degreasing solvent trichloroethylene (TCE) and the fuel byproduct benzene in the bases water supply in the 1970s. However, the water system on the Seymour Johnson Air Force Base was contaminated with PFAS, a group of dangerous chemicals, as a result of military firefighters using aqueous film-forming foam, commonly known as AFFF. Veterans of the formerWurtsmith Air Force BaseinOscodafrom the 1970s, and their families who lived with them on the base, face increased risks of leukemia and other harmful effects from prolonged exposures to toxic volatile organic compounds that were in the now-shuttered bases water supply at the time, a federal health agency has found. Eielson Air Force Base ( AFB) is an active installation established in 1944. A spokesman for Air Mobility Command told Military.com that airmen's missions take them around the globe and often involve Copyright 2023 Military.com. SECURITY - A multi-million dollar lawsuit has been filed against the federal government because of groundwater contamination from the use of firefighting foam at Peterson Air Force Base. At least 12 military bases contaminating water supply with toxic PFAS Testing by the Department of Defense revealed dangerous levels of the contaminants, drawing concern from public health. 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