By Leo Shane III, Stars and Stripes
Stars and Stripes – Mideast edition
Saturday, December 26, 2009
WASHINGTON — Military health officials who have steadfastly denied that burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan cause serious health problems will launch a massive study next year to see if they’re wrong.
Officially, the Pentagon still says the toxic smoke from the pits is not to blame for the fatal cancers and respiratory illnesses suffered by some troops upon returning from the war zones. But Dr. Craig Postlewaite, director of the Defense Department’s Force Health Protection programs, said that researchers “are keeping the door open” on the issue.
“When we look at the health outcome data of those exposed [to the burn pits] we’re not seeing a great increase in respiratory illnesses,” he said in an interview with Stars and Stripes this week. “But we’ve become aware in the last several months that there have been a handful of conditions diagnosed by military physicians where they’ve indicated there could be an inhalational exposure cause.”
That doesn’t mean burn pits are to blame, he said — dust and sand, cigarette smoke or other unknown airborne particulates could be at fault. However, he said, it does indicate that more research is needed on the issue.
The move comes amid criticism that Pentagon officials have overlooked dozens of serious illnesses related to combat zone burn pits — used at numerous bases to dispose of everyday trash, broken furniture and even excess combat equipment.
So far, 22 class-action lawsuits related to alleged burn pit illnesses have been filed in federal courts, covering both contractors and soldiers exposed to the pits. Members of Congress have pushed military officials to respond to anecdotal reports of leukemia, lung tumors and other unusual cancers in troops stationed near some of the largest burn pits.
Most of the department’s current data on the pits’ acrid smoke comes from a 2007 study of the air quality around Balad Air Base in Iraq. Critics have blasted the methodology and thoroughness of the study, and Postlewaite admitted that the research provides only a snapshot of airborne particulate matter at that one location.
“Our previous assessment did not consider combined exposures, whether the dust and smoke together might cause problems,” he said. “It did not consider genetic susceptibility. If there are people being harmed by the smoke, it’s probably a relatively small number of people. But what we care about most is the health of our people.”
Joe Chenelly, spokesman for the Disabled Veterans of America, applauded the decision to further research the inhalation illnesses but “we’d like to see these sick troops getting more help right away and their families getting help right away.”
The group has compiled a list of more than 500 servicemembers suffering from what they believe are burn pit-related illnesses.
“We’d like to see every one of these burn pits shut down today,” he said. “The study costs will likely be more than what it would cost to get proper incinerators at these bases.”
Postlewaite said officials are still organizing sites and collection details for the study, but he expects a formal report on the data by the end of 2010. Both the Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center and the Department’s Deployment Health Research Center are involved in the effort.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has also promised to investigate the long-term health effects of exposure to the smoke, although the department does not currently recognize burn pit exposure as a presumed combat-connected illness.
In August, President Barack Obama promised the issue would not become another “Agent Orange,” the name for herbicides used heavily during the Vietnam War and later linked to serious health problems in civilians and U.S. troops. Veterans groups have fought with military agencies for years over health benefits related to that chemical exposure. (Click HERE for original article)
By Kelly Kennedy – Staff writer
Posted : Friday Dec 18, 2009 17:27:31 EST
The airman who first raised health concerns over burn pits at Joint Base Balad in Iraq says the Defense Department data — which officials used to say the burn pits cause no known long-term health effects — is worthless.
And Air Force Lt. Col Darrin Curtis, a bioenvironmental flight commander who retired in November, is the one who created the plan to collect the air specimens near the plume.
“You could only sample so much,” he said Friday. “I think it’s more than difficult; it’s impossible. It would cost as much to bring in incinerators as it would to do an adequate study.”
When they set up the sampling equipment, he said the smoke flew up in a 90-degree plume away from the air collectors. The equipment instead collected much cleaner air.
“The data’s not there,” he said. “With something like this, there’s no way to do it.”
In a December 2006 memo first reported in October 2008, Curtis called the burn pit “an acute health hazard for individuals. There is also the possibility for chemical health hazards associated with the smoke.” Air Force bioenvironmental engineers are experts in occupational and environmental workplace hazards.
According to his memo, the military burned Styrofoam, unexploded ordnance, petroleum products, plastics, rubber, dining facility trash, paint and solvents, and medical waste in the Balad burn pit. The memo said those items could have exposed troops to benzene, an aircraft fuel known to cause leukemia; arsenic; dichlorofluromethane, or Freon; carbon monoxide; ethylbenzene; formaldehyde; hydrogen cyanide; nitrogen dioxide; sulfuric acid; and xylene.
But ever since the memo surfaced, military officials have said there are no known long-term health effects from the pit. They based their statements on the plume air testing.
Officials did not waver from that position until this week, when CNN reported that R. Craig Postlewaite said, “Certain individuals may be more susceptible to the effects of burn-pit smoke because of genetics and pre-existing health conditions, and that some of these personnel may be at risk of more serious health effects following prolonged smoke exposure.” Postlewaite is the acting director, force health protection and readiness programs, office of the assistance secretary of defense for health affairs.
Curtis decided to speak up after the CNN report on Postlewaite. He said he never felt any pressure while he was in the military to not talk about the problems he saw. In fact, he spoke with Military Times by e-mail a year ago.
But he’s frustrated by what happened after his memo came out.
“Why send these people over there if you’re not going to listen to them?” he said, referring to the bioenvironmental personnel.
Curtis said he knew there was a problem as soon as he arrived in Balad.
“I saw a lot of smoke,” he said. “That was as soon as I got off the plane. The burn pit smoke, especially at night, would sink right to the ground. A lot of the time, the smoke was just in my face.”
He knew he needed to test the plume to see if the service members were at risk. But though he and his team used weather data to try to determine the best places to put the testing equipment, keeping in mind where they had power supplies, the weather didn’t cooperate on the collection days, and the plume smoke floated away.
“We really wanted to collect and get the best data we could,” Curtis said. “We thought that was going to be the best shot for helping people.”
But Curtis sees another measure.
“I think some of the cancers and the respiratory things are outside the normal boundaries for a fairly healthy population,” he said. “We can’t do anything about the sand,” he said, referring to the airborne particulate matter common to that area, “but at least the burn pits are something we could have done something about.”
According to the Defense Department, the burn pits at Balad were shut down Oct. 1, but burn pits at other bases throughout Iraq and Afghanistan are still operating. Incinerators can cost millions of dollars.
The next step, Curtis said, is to take care of sick service members.
“The people with health issues — what are we going to do with them?” he said. “You’ve got hundreds and thousands of people who have been stationed over there. I pray every night that I’m wrong, but I don’t think I’m going to be.” Click HERE for original article)
Just in case you missed the link to Darrin Curtis’ memo click HERE.
By Adam Levine, CNN Pentagon Producer
December 18, 2009 8:36 a.m. EST
Washington (CNN) — The military is backing off its previous position and acknowledging that some troops exposed to the burning of refuse on military bases could be susceptible to long-term health effects.
Since the issue first arose two years ago, Pentagon health officials have insisted that, based on its analysis, troops who were near burn pits at Joint Base Balad in Iraq — the largest base in that country — faced no long-term health hazards. That covered most of the troops who passed through the base.
The Department of Defense found that the burn pits, which are used instead of incinerators on some bases and outposts in Iraq and Afghanistan, could cause effects in the short term — including irritated eyes and upper respiratory system problems — that can lead to persistent coughing. But the department said “it is less clear what other longer-term health effects [there] may be.”
But one of the top military health officials, Dr. Craig Postlewaite, signaled in a recent interview with the Salt Lake Tribune that certain troops, who have other medical conditions, may be at risk for long-term effects.
“Over time, we have come to recognize that certain individuals may be more susceptible to the effects of burn-pit smoke than others because of genetics and pre-existing health conditions and that some of these personnel may be at risk of more serious health effects following prolonged smoke exposure, and possibility to other inhalational exposures, such as tobacco smoke and possibly high levels of air borne particulate matter,” Postlewaite said this week in a statement provided to CNN.
The military now suspects that exposure to burn-pit smoke combined with other factors — such as smoking, proximity to the pit, certain genetic factors or pre-existing conditions — could lead to longer-term effects.
After an outcry from veterans concerned that burn-pit exposure was not being acknowledged by the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs, both agencies have begun a larger study of troops to determine what other health effects there could be.
Service members have complained of symptoms ranging from chronic bronchitis, asthma, sleep apnea, chronic coughs and allergy-like symptoms to more severe issues including heart problems, lymphoma and leukemia.
A senior master sergeant with the Air Force, who did not want his name used because he is still in service, said that he now has a growth on his lungs and that his doctors think the burn pits were a contributing cause.
He deployed to Iraq in October 2004 and worked there for six months as a contract supervisor for the Army. His daily routine included driving past the burn pits at Balad as he ferried Iraqi contractors around the massive base.
As he drove by, the master sergeant could see the refuse being burned, from trash to concrete to sides of tin buildings and sheet metal.
“You just held your breath, because if you breathed, it would burn,” he told CNN in a phone interview.
He slept about a mile from the pit, but, depending on the winds, the burning could create a “fog” over his compound.
“You could tell when the trash was burning,” he said. “You could smell if it was really heavy and feel it burning in your nostrils and lungs.”
The master sergeant was in good health before he left for Iraq. Earlier in his military career, he had worked with hazardous materials, but a predeployment scan in 2004 showed his lungs were in fine shape.
In 2006, after finding he would get easily winded and feel discomfort in his chest, the sergeant underwent testing, and a military doctor discovered a nodule on his lungs. A biopsy showed it was benign, but he needs to be tested every year. His doctors are concerned that his family history of cancer makes him more susceptible to further problems.
But his case illustrates just how difficult it is to link symptoms to cause.
As he said, he had worked with hazardous materials before he deployed. After Iraq, he was stationed in Naples, Italy, where the base also had trash disposal problems. Still, he knows that his lungs were clear before he was in Balad and that within a year of returning, he had the growth.
The Disabled American Veterans organization has been keeping a database of troops who report problems related to the pit. In one year, nearly 500 service members or their families have come forward, said the DAV’s John Wilson.
That registry is “very narrow,” Wilson said, because it relies on self-reporting. Rep. Tim Bishop, D-New York, has proposed legislation to have the Defense Department and Veterans Affairs create a registry of all service members exposed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Congress already passed legislation, which the president signed, to prohibit the use of burn pits for hazardous waste unless there is no alternative.
A study that compared Iraq veterans with those who served stateside found that those who were in Iraq were diagnosed with new-onset adult asthma at twice the rate of stateside troops.
The head of the allergy section of the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in North Port, New York, told Congress that since 2004, he has clearly seen an effect on previously healthy and athletic service members.
“Now these individuals suffer from a variety of respiratory illness, including asthma and difficulty breathing during exertion,” Dr. Anthony Szema told a policy hearing in November.
That’s what happened to Reservist Michelle Franco, who was a nurse at Balad from September 2006 through January 2007.
“What I saw was the smoke. What I felt was the smoke. What I smelled was the smoke,” Franco said of her time at Balad. After she left, she started having breathing problems.
“When I came back, I couldn’t climb stairs without problems breathing,” she said. Tests by pulmonologists found asthma-like conditions, but her condition wasn’t asthma. A private doctor and a military one told her it probably was caused by exposure to contaminants in Iraq.
Getting that diagnosis was a struggle for her. When she returned, burn pit exposure was not a recognized issue. She was told to lose weight, which she did, and it didn’t help. She also exercised regularly and said she took all types of medicine, but medications didn’t help, either.
As a nurse, Franco knew that she didn’t just have asthma. But she said others may not realize they have greater problems.
“Because nobody knows, it seems to me the military member needs to be given the benefit of the doubt. I feel badly for the young men who don’t understand this isn’t asthma,” Franco said.
Franco has had to prove to the military that her service caused her illness.
The military is trying to help that by better recording where people served, according to a Pentagon spokeswoman. Before 2006, at best, the records showed what country people served in. Now they can be tracked to the “ZIP code,” the spokeswoman said. (click HERE for the original article)
For more article and Hearing information on the Burn Pits click HERE.
Another awesome report from the DC Bureau. This video was created by Katie Manning, a multimedia journalist for DC Bureau. If you are having problems viewing this video here. Click HERE to view it at DC Bureau.
Backing away from steadfast official denial, the U.S. military’s senior health protection official said Monday that some service members might suffer long-term medical problems as a direct result of exposure to smoke and fumes from open-air burn pits scattered throughout Iraq and Afghanistan.
Physician Craig Postlewaite, director of Force Health Protection and Readiness Programs, said that while scientific evidence has yet to prove the link, the personal stories of veterans coming forward to report long-term health problems have convinced him of the connection.
“We feel at this point in time that it’s quite plausible — in fact likely — that there are a small number of people that have been affected with longer-term health problems,” Postlewaite said Monday in an interview with The Salt Lake Tribune.
As recently as last month, Postlewaite had maintained the Defense Department’s years-old position on the issue, telling Stars and Stripes that “only minor, temporary effects have been identified with the burn pit smoke.” In July he told the Military Times that an assessment of the burn pit at the largest U.S. facility in Iraq, Joint Air Base Balad, found “no indication of any long-term health risks in personnel.”
It was the sight and smell of the Balad pit that led an environmental engineer from Hill Air Force Base to write a memo calling the acres-large inferno “an acute health hazard.”
In the memo, Air Force officer Darrin Curtis warned that dozens of toxins, including arsenic, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide, were going up in smoke at the Balad pit. U.S. service members and contractors were burning hundreds of tons of weapons, chemicals, plastics — and even amputated limbs from the nearby theater hospital — each week.
Curtis’ memo set off widespread speculation that smoke from the Balad pit, and possibly others, was to blame for myriad health problems faced by returning veterans. But Curtis, who has since separated from the Air Force, told The Tribune he didn’t intend to be a whistleblower — he only wanted to help loosen the bureaucratic purse strings holding back money for a long-promised incinerator.
“It wasn’t one of those ‘God and country’ things,” Curtis said. “I wasn’t trying to sacrifice myself. It was 2006. We’d gotten there in 2003. It had been forever and these things weren’t getting fixed. My understanding was that there were different allowances for money depending on whether something was a health issue or wasn’t a health issue, and I wrote the memo just so that everyone would know it was a health issue.”
Relying on air and blood samples taken in early 2006, however, the military contended it had no reason to believe service members exposed to the Balad pit would suffer anything more than short-term respiratory problems and irritated eyes.
That position ran contrary to the contention of hundreds who had served at Balad and were dealing with long-term respiratory illnesses and other more serious problems.
Jill Wilkins
Last month, Jill Wilkins began collecting such stories on a Facebook page devoted to those exposed to burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan. Wilkins’ husband, Kevin, served his first tour of duty in Balad in 2006. He died of a brain tumor in 2008. Dozens of others who have posted on Wilkins’ site have told of loved ones who suffered or died from rare forms of blood disorders and cancer, including leukemia.
“It can’t all be coincidence,” said one of the site’s members, JoAnne Och, whose son Steven is one of several people named on the site who died of Acute myeloid leukemia shortly after returning from Balad. “For one thing, you don’t send sick troops over there, so for all of these people to be coming home with these very serious problems, there’s something causing that.”
The change in the military’s position on the issue comes shortly after President Barack Obama pledged that health concerns related to burn pits would not become another Agent Orange.
“Nobody is served by denial or sweeping things under the rug,” Obama told a roundtable of military reporters in August.
Regardless of past denials, the military has taken steps to clean up its waste disposal operations. Since 2006, it has purchased and installed dozens of incinerators for use in Iraq, including at Balad. In October, Obama signed a law prohibiting open-air burning of medical and hazardous waste except in which the secretary of defense deems there is no alternative.
Postlewaite declined to say what diseases he believed were most likely tied to burn pit exposure, saying it “would be premature for me to comment.”
But he said studies are under way to try to determine the most likely related illnesses. “You’ve got to do some preliminary studies to generate the hypotheses that then you would test with larger studies,” he said.
Postlewaite said he doesn’t know how long it will take to test his new suspicions. Complicating matters, he said, is the possibility that exposure to smoke from the pits wasn’t the only factor making people sick — it may have been a combination of exposure and other causes that led to long-term illnesses.
“Our best guess is that there are some individuals that have an increased susceptibility to the smoke,” he said. “It could be genetic or some pre-existing health condition… and it also could have been based on combined exposures.”
At this point, he said, “we really don’t know.” (click HERE for original article)
I have taken the liberty of inserting pics and links to associated documents and posts into the original Salt Lake Tribune article. To read all the posts I have on the Burn Pits click HERE. For all the pics I have on the Burn Pits click HERE.
I have had the pleasure of working with Jill Wilkins for over a year now. I have to say, the victims of the burn pits could have no better advocate on their side.
Eustis (Florida) Woman Is a Crusader against Burn Pits
posted by eric on 7th, 2009
Story By: Michael Harris
Photo By: Anthony Rao
Jill Wilkins
Jill Wilkins talks freely about her loss with anyone within earshot – and that may be over a cup of coffee in her dining room, sitting in her study and conversing with people over the Internet or in front of Congress if that is what is to be.
The Eustis resident calls the last year and a half an “adventure,” a ride that started in a tiny Veteran’s Administration office in Tavares where she felt absolutely sick after leaving that office just several months after her husband, USAF Major Kevin E. Wilkins, RN died of a brain tumor. img_1478
Her cause is one where she helps families of other Iraqi War soldiers make sure they collect their benefits and what is entitled to them as a possible result of exposure to toxic chemicals. The toxic chemicals are caused by burn pits – a waste-disposal system of KBR, the company contracted to provide services to the military bases overseas.
According to a lawsuit by the Washington law firm Burke O’Neil; their clients have seen batteries, unexploded ordnance, gas cans, mattresses, rocket pods, and plastic and medical waste (including body parts). The fumes contain carcinogenic dioxins, heavy metals and particulates, according to an Army–Air Force risk assessment, and they flow freely across bases.
It is believed that Kevin Wilkins died as a result of these toxins.
“When he died from the brain tumor, the Lt. Colonel Johnson who was there (at the hospital) really didn’t talk about anything because it happened (Kevin going into the hospital and his passing) in like five days,” Jill says. “Afterward, while I was signing the paperwork, I was chatting with the two (administrative assistants) from Patrick Air Force Base and they were the ones who said Colonel (Lewis) Neace had questioned them on when Kevin’s headaches started. I remember the doctor in the emergency room at Waterman asked if Kevin was around any toxic chemicals and he said, ‘oh yeah all kinds.’ And then Kevin started talking about the burn pits.”
In the end, Jill has received her benefits and what she was entitled to by the military by shear luck. A little-known statute by the VA states that if a soldier dies within a year of his or her tour, the family is automatically entitled to the benefits. Major Wilkins’ second tour ended on April 3, 2007, yet he died on April 1, 2008.
It is yet to be determined if the burn pits were the cause of Major Wilkins’ death and, like him, there are many other soldiers who suffered from chronic or unusual medical complications that never remotely had them prior to going to Iraq.
“My whole thing now is what else can I do to help other people?” she says. “I only got this far because other people helped me. I mean if all of these people didn’t help me, I would have given up after that first appointment at the VA office.”
Bound and determined
After Colonel Neace questioned how Major Wilkins had passed, Jill applied for her benefits through the VA citing his death as a possible result of the burn pits. The woman behind the desk turned her down without so much as a kind word, claiming she didn’t have enough evidence.
“It was a horrible experience,” Jill says. “She said I didn’t have enough information. I was just sick when I left there.”
Through research and making friends on the Internet, she began making headway through the VA office in St. Pete. Her story is the main subject of talks given by Deborah Crawford from Oregon aka Ms. Sparky. Ms. Sparky is a former KBR employee, who has returned and speaks out vehemently about the contracting company. Ms. Sparky and Jill have become very good friends.
But it was one of her Internet friends, who asked about the dates of Major Wilkins’ tour, which helped Jill the most. It was her friend Mike that pointed out that the Major had passed within a year of his tour ending and mentioned that Jill was entitled to benefits.
“It’s weird because nobody else knew about that and of course I didn’t know,” she says.
It was also about that time that Wolf Blitzer of CNN heard of Jill’s story about the burn pits and asked her to be on the show. That was last December and Jill did tell her story.
Three weeks later, she received her benefits from the VA.
Not Stopping
As she states, it could have ended at that point. But it didn’t – what of her friends she had made on the Internet? What about the other families who have come down with complications?
“My purpose now is to help other people,” Jill says. “Because really if some those people didn’t have a Web site and I wouldn’t have found it, then I wouldn’t have been connected to this other lady, Cheryl Harris, whose son was electrocuted in one of the showers over there which KBR did the wiring for. She’s still waiting on her benefits.”
It was earlier this year Jill was contacted by the Washington law firm of Burke O’Neil to help speak on a lawsuit against KBR.
“What scared me is when they said, ‘if you’re willing’ they would fly down that week and talk to me,” Jill recalls. “I wasn’t familiar with law firms and I was having trouble getting some health benefits. I said this is something I can’t do right now. Some of my friends on the email were showing me the lawsuit. But I had one friend who said I shouldn’t feel guilty about coming forward in the lawsuit. Really, he said ‘they need you and need your story because your husband already died and you had been through the VA department and he said they need you on this case.’ He said, ‘by you not joining the case would be weaker for others.’
“I ended up doing it because my case would help all of the other soldiers,” she added. “It seems like there are about 200 soldiers who were in this lawsuit.”
According to the Burke O’Neil Web site, the lawsuit is still going on.
In a Newsweek article from June, linked on the Burke O’Neil Web site, KBR won’t discuss burn pits while it reviews the suits. The article continued by saying a KBR spokeswoman e-mailed that KBR isn’t responsible for the Balad pit (Burke alleges it is) and that “any burn pit operated in Iraq or Afghanistan is done pursuant to Army guidelines.”
The article also mentions that Kevin Robbins, a former KBR employee who ran a pit near Al Kut, says he had no guidelines on what could be burned when he arrived.
A Hobby that’s More Than a Hobby
For Jill, with the loss of her husband always on her mind, the whole scene has been “a learning adventure.”
For the soldiers continuing a battle with the VA and through the lawsuit, it’s a financial burden. One example had Burke O’Neil’s suit carried onto Congress and one soldier couldn’t afford to get to Washington to speak on his behalf.
That’s another area where Jill has come in; she sponsored the soldier’s trip to Washington.
“It wasn’t that expensive. They already had a place to stay, so I flew him and his wife there, and his speech was awesome,” Jill says. “He included Kevin in it. So that was another thing I could do to help.”
She tells the story of the young soldier who was there as a weatherman who stayed in a tower. According to Jill, that soldier, Tony, has a blood disorder and has to take a chemotherapy pill every day.
She wants to keep in this fight for others because Jill came very close herself to being in the same boat as other soldiers and their families.
It’s not been determined if Kevin’s brain tumor was caused by the burn pits, but the fact he died within one year of his last tour made Jill very fortunate. If it had been as much as three days later, she wouldn’t have been.
“You know it’s not that I wouldn’t have got my benefits down the road, but it would have been a longer battle. I would have been with everybody else right now in the same group fighting.
“But I never got something that wasn’t (owed). I’m receiving everything that I can get.”
It was through friends that kept her going. She owes that to them and others, who will be returning home. In the future more and more cases, like Major Wilkins’, will be coming and challenges will occur, but Jill is ready to fight at home for our soldiers.
“I’ve already surpassed what I thought I could do because I put my story out there on CNN,” she says. “But then it started a snowball effect, because now people are questioning the burn pit, who was subjected to it and what’s happening now.
“You think after you get your benefits that you’re done, but then your Internet buddies get on there and they start talking about how you need to do this and speak out. I figured God gave me this ability to be comfortable in front of TV and it’s an adventure for me to do this. If they called me right now and said ‘will you speak in front of Congress?’ Oh yeah – in a heartbeat.”
Lt. Col. Darrin Curtis
Former Bioenvironmental Engineer, U.S. Air Force
Rick Lamberth
Former KBR Employee
L. Russell Keith
Former KBR Medic
Anthony Szema, M.D
Chief of the Allergy Section, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Northport, New York
Click HERE to watch entire unedited video, read witness testimony and Senator Dorgan’s opening statements
I just love the way Senator Dorgan and the Senate Democratic Policy Committee does not back down and keeps nipping at the heels of fraud, waste and abuse that is Defense Department contracting!
BOISE (CN) – KBR and Halliburton poisoned U.S. troops and civilian contractors by burning an immense variety of toxic, unsorted wastes in Iraq and Afghanistan to cut costs and preserve profits, according to a federal class action. The class claims at least 100,000 people were endangered by the contractors’ “utter indifference to and conscious disregard” of troops’ welfare.
The class claims the Pentagon contractors, “motivated by financial gain,” ignored contract requirements minimize risks, environmental effects and human exposure to toxic fumes when disposing of waste. Instead, the contractors cut corners and burned huge amounts of waste in open pits; fire and smoke rose hundreds of feet into the air, emitting toxic gases and carcinogens.
The complaint says KBR and Halliburton burned “every type of waste imaginable,” including trucks, tires, lithium batteries, Styrofoam, rubber, petroleum, lubricants, metals, hydraulic fluids, munitions boxes, medical waste, biohazard materials, human corpses, medical supplies, paints, solvents, asbestos insulation, pesticides, polyvinyl chloride pipes, animal carcasses, dangerous chemicals and hundreds of thousands of plastic water bottles.
Lead plaintiff George Lundy of Idaho worked for KBR building burn pits and is undergoing chemotherapy to treat the colon cancer he says is a result of his repeated exposure to the gases and fumes.
The class seeks damages in district court for physical injuries, emotional distress, fear of disease, and need for continued medical care. Lundy is represented by Curtis D. McKenzie. (Click HERE for original article)
Witnesses at this hearing, which will be the twenty-first in a series of hearings held by the Democratic Policy Committee on contracting abuses and corruption in Iraq and Afghanistan, will discuss the health risks associated with the continued use of open-air burn pits by the U.S. military and contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although military guidelines allow the use of burn pits to dispose of waste only in emergency situations, most large U.S. military installations have continued to use burn pits for years, despite growing evidence that exposure to burn pit smoke may be causing an increased incidence of chronic lung diseases, respiratory ailments, neurological disorders and cancer. Hearing witnesses will testify that plastics, paint, solvents, petroleum products, rubber, and medical waste, including human body parts, have been burned in the pits. Former private contractors will testify that even at established bases in the Green Zone, companies continued to use burn pits instead of clean-burning incinerators to reduce costs and increase profits.
KBR was contracted to recycle cafeteria waste at Forward Operating Base Warhorse. Such spotty accountability is coming under new scrutiny; an Oct. 30 report reveals that transactions worth $10.7 billion are being audited.
By Tom A. Peter | The Christian Science Monitor | October 30, 2009
Forward Operating Base Warhorse, Diyala Province, Iraq
In this desert fortress of housing trailers and concrete barriers, military contractor KBR has launched a recycling campaign – a kind of oasis in the military, an institution not exactly renowned for environmental activism.
As soldiers exit the dining facility, run by KBR and its subcontractor Najlaa International Catering Services Iraq, they see signs along the emerald walkway urging those who “like to recycle” to follow the path and “Think Green.” At the end of the path, soldiers sort aluminum cans and plastic silverware into separate bins.
But there’s one problem: The recyclable goods are thrown into a pit with the rest of the trash and burned. While this is likely to disappoint soldiers who “like to recycle,” it also is a breach of the government’s contract with KBR to run the dining facility on FOB Warhorse, according to the US government’s Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA).
The chimerical recycling program is apparently a microcosmic example of the spotty accountability under which contractors have operated – at substantial expense to US taxpayers. A report issued Oct. 30 by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) said that audits of $6.4 billion worth of contracts revealed “internal weaknesses,” including inadequate oversight of invoices and excessive change orders. The report also noted evidence of duplicate payments and payments sent to fictitious addresses and unapproved contractors.
Eyewitness account: ‘recycling’ burned in trash pit
When first asked about the recycling program at FOB Warhorse, Xopher Bryant, program manager of Najlaa International Catering Services Iraq, responded in an e-mail, “The innovative recycling efforts we conduct at FOB Warhorse are a direct result of our company’s wish to make a positive impact in all areas of our business dealings and are offered as a cost benefit to our client and customers.”
When asked to show the actual recycling operations to a reporter at FOB Warhorse, Mr. Bryant, who was not on site, cited media policies that did not allow for such interaction between company officials and the press, but encouraged this reporter to investigate for himself. With two escorts from the military’s public relations outfit – Spc. Christopher Bruce and Sgt. Jeremy Pitcher – the Monitor sought out the KBR manager in the FOB Warhorse’s cafeteria, which serves 2,000 to 3,000 people. But the manager, who refused to be named, repeatedly refused to help the Monitor verify the existence of KBR’s recycling program.
A soldier checking badges at the cafeteria’s entrance said, however, that she was fairly certain that the recycling material was thrown in with the trash – a practice the Monitor witnessed firsthand.
When one of the trash cans used for “recyclables” in the cafeteria filled up, workers emptied it into a dumpster placed in a long row with identical dumpsters. That dumpster was then emptied into a dump truck that proceeded to collect the contents of numerous other dumpsters, confirmed by the military PR officials to be used for trash only, around the base. Then the truck’s cargo – trash and “recycling” alike – was emptied into a huge burn pit and set ablaze. Apart from the cafeteria trash cans, nowhere on the base was there any evidence of infrastructure – dumpsters, trucks, or sorting facilities – for separating recycling and trash.
After the Monitor’s eyewitness confirmation that the recycling program was not operational, Bryant and his colleagues did not respond to nearly a dozen e-mails asking for a comment.
Heather Browne, KBR’s director of corporate communications in Houston, Texas, did respond, however. She said in a statement that KBR “is committed to environmental responsibility” and, based on its “ongoing review, at sites where KBR provides services related to waste disposal, KBR complies with all applicable military directives and contractual requirements.”
Mission taking precedence over transparency
With contractors providing almost all basic services for US forces, their numbers have already reached unprecedented levels: Contractors now outnumber uniformed US military personnel in Afghanistan, according to a recent Congressional Research Service report.
“The fundamental problem is that the government has no capacity to do things itself,” says Pratap Chatterjee, author of “Halliburton’s Army.” “As a result, they’re willing to overlook little things like recycling and even big things like fraud so long as their mission is met.”
Although the US has used military contractors as far back as the Revolutionary War, they didn’t begin to proliferate until the early 1990s. Former President George H. W. Bush began relying more heavily on contractors to reduce the government’s footprint. In the Balkans conflict, the first billion-dollar contract was awarded to KBR.
As the role of contractors increased, the Clinton administration passed a ruling in December 2000 to weed out firms with felony charges in their pasts and “blacklist” contractors that had past environmental, labor, or federal-trade violations lodged against them. Former President George W. Bush, who took office a month later, repealed the law in 2001.
Obama administration may take harder line
Today, if a contractor fails to fulfill its obligations, a DCMA spokesperson says that the normal protocol is that the firm will be issued a “corrective action request” to tell the government how it will address the cause of the compliance issue. He refused to discuss KBR’s recycling case, and declined to be named, in accordance with the agency’s policy.
Allegations of misconduct in Iraq targeting companies including KBR, its former parent company, Halliburton, and Blackwater – renamed Xe Services – have periodically drawn the wrath of US lawmakers. But government-contractor experts say that the focus on providing for troops in the field often may trump such concerns.
“All of these negative things that are happening are not seemingly making an impact at a significant level where policymakers are paying attention. Instead, it’s quite the opposite; policymakers are still seeing them as cost-effective,” says Dawn Rothe, a criminology professor at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Va., citing an August 2008 Congressional Budget Office report as evidence.
Before the government reconsiders its use of contractors, Dr. Rothe says she thinks there will have to be “more revelations of some serious harm, legal discrepancies, and criminal behavior.”
But while allegations and investigations of corruption have so far done little to crimp contractors’ style in Iraq and Afghanistan, there are signs that the Obama administration is looking to effect systemic change. SIGIR, which reports to the secretaries of State and Defense, is auditing a further 22,000 transactions involving $10.7 billion – a substantial chunk of the $50 billion the US has spent to date on reconstruction efforts in Iraq.
“We’re at a point now with tightening budgets and the economic crisis … that we’re also not going to put up with waste, fraud, and abuse in government spending,” says Scott Amey, general consul at the nonprofit Project on Government Oversight in Washington, who adds that there’s a push to increase the government’s ability to defer, detect, and prosecute fraud.”At that point we’re going to place an emphasis on contractor accountability as well as getting the most value out of the dollars that we’re awarding these contractors.” (Link to original article)
BRENDAN KEARNEY
Daily Record Legal Affairs Writer
October 20, 2009 7:53 PM
A raft of lawsuits filed across the country by soldiers and contractors who say they were sickened by “burn pits” in Iraq and Afghanistan have been transferred to a federal judge in Maryland.
The suits against Halliburton Co. and its former subsidiary, KBR Inc., allege a variety of waste — from batteries to medical detritus, including human remains — was tossed and torched in huge, uncovered holes near army bases.
The plaintiffs, who hope to become a class of thousands, say the hazardous smoke from these sites caused ailments from rashes to upper respiratory problems to cancer.
Some of the 22 suits also allege the defendants did not properly treat water or provided substandard food.
“It was their obligation to do this in a safe manner, and they didn’t do so,” plaintiffs’ attorney William T. O’Neil said in an interview Tuesday.
His Washington, D.C.-based firm, Burke O’Neil LLC, filed all 22 of the cases and did not object when KBR sought to have them transferred to U.S. District Court in Greenbelt for pretrial management.
The Texas-based defendants acted “egregiously merely to make more money for themselves,” O’Neil wrote in the suit originally filed in Montgomery County Circuit Court in January.
In an e-mail, a KBR spokeswoman said the “general assertion that KBR knowingly harmed troops is unfounded.”
She added that KBR did not operate the most infamous burn pit at Balad, the largest American base in Iraq, and that the others are operated at the direction of the military.
Messages left with the U.S. Defense Department were not returned Tuesday, but the department has previously denied that the pits pose a health threat to service men and women.
KBR, which broke from Halliburton in April 2007, requested consolidated pretrial proceedings to eliminate duplication by lawyers and judges and prevent inconsistent pretrial rulings.
The Greenbelt court makes sense because it is near federal government facilities and the defendants’ offices in Northern Virginia, according to the Oct. 16 transfer order signed by John G. Heyburn II, chairman of the Panel on Multidistrict Litigation.
Judge Roger W. Titus has not yet scheduled hearings in the cases, which, if they survive pretrial motions by the defense, will return to the courts where they originated for trial.
Concern about the burn pits, which exist at many large military installations in the two combat theaters, has been “kind of been percolating around for a while,” said O’Neil. “A lot of people came back from serving overseas and had lung problems that they had never had before.”
He pointed to a 2008 study by Vanderbilt University researchers that showed higher incidences of respiratory diseases among returning soldiers.
Among the first news reports of the potential health problems associated with them came almost a year ago in the Army Times, an independently owned newspaper that covers the military.
Since then, soldiers have told stories of chemicals, materiel and other known toxins being dumped and burned together throughout the campaigns.
And the smoke isn’t the only thing affecting the plaintiffs’ health, according to the Maryland suit, filed on behalf of a soldier from Silver Spring and a KBR employee from Edgewood, among others.
“Wild dogs in the area raided the burn pit and carried off human remains,” the suit states. “The wild dogs could be seen roaming the base with body parts in their mouths, to the great distress of the U.S. forces.”
The Maryland suit also alleges troops were exposed to contaminated water from the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers and that unchlorinated water filled their swimming pools.
The plaintiffs seek damages “in an amount sufficient to strip Defendants of all the revenue and profits earned from their pattern of constant misconduct,” according to the Maryland suit.
Congress also has taken up the cause. According to an Oct. 11 report in The Hill newspaper, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 doesn’t ban the use of burn pits outright but restricts their use and adds oversight. Senators have asked the Department of Defense Inspector General to investigate further.
Asked about the burn pits in August, President Barack Obama promised the health worries would not go unaddressed like those surrounding Agent Orange, the defoliant used in Vietnam that caused widespread medical issues but whose deleterious effects were denied by the military for many years. (click HERE for original article)
Soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are in danger from toxic chemicals, yet most don’t know what they’ve been exposed to or where to get help.
By Nora Eisenberg, The Guardian – Posted on November 11, 2008
What does a war injury look like? In the case of Iraq, we tend to picture veterans bravely getting on with their lives with the help of steel legs or computerized limbs. Trauma injuries are certainly the most visible of health problems — the ones that grab our attention. A campaign ad for congressman Tom Udall featured an Iraq war veteran who had survived a shot to his head. Speaking through the computer that now substitutes for his voice, Sergeant Erik Schei extols the top-notch care that saved his life.
As politicians argue about healthcare for veterans, it is generally people like Sgt Schei that they have in mind, men and women torn apart by a bullet or bomb. And of course, these Iraq war veterans must receive the best care available for such complex and catastrophic injuries.
Unfortunately, the dangers of modern war extend far beyond weapons. As Iraqis know only too well, areas of Iraq today are among the most polluted on the planet — so toxic that merely to live, eat and sleep (never mind to fight) in these zones is to risk death. Thousands of soldiers coming home from the war may have been exposed to chemicals that are known to cause cancers and neurological problems. What’s most tragic is that the veterans themselves do not always realize that they are in danger from chemical poisoning. Right now, there is no clear way for Iraq war veterans to find out what they’ve been exposed to and where to get help.
In October, the Military Times reported on the open-air pits on U.S. bases in Iraq, where troops incinerate tons of waste. Because of such pits, tens of thousands of soldiers may be breathing air contaminated with burning Freon, jet fuel and other carcinogens. According to reports, soldiers are coughing up blood or the black goop that has been nicknamed “plume crud”.
In other cases, soldiers may have been exposed to poisons spread during efforts to restore Iraq’s infrastructure. In 2003, for instance, members of the Indiana national guard were put in charge of protecting a water-treatment plant. They were told not to worry about the bright orange dust lying in piles around the plant, swirling in the air and gathering in the folds of their uniforms. In fact, Indiana soldiers spent weeks or months in a wasteland contaminated with sodium dichromate. The chemical, made famous after its role as the villain in the movie Erin Brockovich, is used to peel corrosion off of water pipes. It is a carcinogen that attacks the lungs and sinuses.
Today, a decade and a half after the first Gulf war, we know that such exposure may lead to widespread suffering. In 1991, veterans began to exhibit fatigue, fevers, rashes, joint pain, intestinal problems, memory loss, mood swings and even cancers, a cluster of symptoms and conditions referred to now as Gulf war syndrome (or illness). For years, the U.S. department of defense maintained that stress caused the veterans’ symptoms. Veterans groups blamed war-related toxins. This year, the National Academy of Sciences published an extensive review of years of scientific study of Gulf war illness that concluded a cause and effect relationship existed between the widespread illnesses among veterans and exposure to powerful neurotoxins. Complementing the U.S. studies is an emerging body of epidemiological data linking increased incidence of Iraqi cancer, birth defects, infant mortality and multi-system diseases to toxic exposure.
Strangely enough, though, there has been almost no discussion of whether today’s soldiers — those fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan — have also been injured by wartime poisons. We don’t have a word yet for the constellation of cancers, psychological ills and systemic diseases that may be caused by toxins in today’s wars.
In order to care for our veterans, we must do more than offer state-of-the-art hospitals and high-tech prosthetics. Veterans will need information about what poisons they have breathed or touched or drunk and when.
What would such an effort look like? First the military would need to disclose all known incidents of toxic exposure. Then it would have to reach out to veterans and give them information about how to receive care for conditions that arise from this exposure.
This summer, senator Evan Bayh made a first stab at such a system. Bayh pushed the national guard to track down hundreds of those Indiana soldiers who may have breathed orange dust back in 2003. Most of the soldiers are now civilians scattered across the U.S., unaware that they are at high risk for lung cancer and other respiratory diseases. Some of them may already be struggling with illness. The national guard is making an effort to search for these veterans and provide them with a phone number to call in order to seek medical help.
That’s a good first step. But what about all the other veterans who believe that they have returned home from the war healthy? Without knowing it, they may be carrying a small bomb inside them. And they have a right to know.
How many more articles, suits and hearings will have to happen before we find out who knew about it, what they knew about it, when they knew about it and where these exposures may have occurred? In the hearing held on June 20, 2008 at least two KBR employees were terminated for voicing their concerns, to KBR management, about being exposed to sodium dichromate, according to witness testimony. This was also mentioned again in the recent follow-up hearing on August 3, 2009. Then there is the concern over exposure to toxins from the burn pits, located at nearly every camp in theater. This could mean that virtually everyone that has been in Iraq or Afghanistan is facing potential health risks due to this exposure. These are the known hazzards that have been brought to light, what about the “unknowns” or undisclosed hazzards? Does anyone know what that black stuff leaching up through the soil at Taji is or if it has been tested? What about BUCCA, there were some emails that were written, in late 2005 or early 2006 , concerning things in the air/ soil that people on that camp may have been exposed to. (Ms Sparky would love copies of these emails if someone has them) There has also been talk about things at Fallujah, Iskan and elsewhere.
If you have information, or documentation, regarding any of the potential hazzards listed above or know of others, please email them to Ms Sparky and she will get them to folks that need to see them. Not only do our soldiers and the personnel serving them have a right to know about potential health risks. If this information has been intentionally withheld, those that have withheld it, need to be made accountable for their actions.
By Katie Connolly | NEWSWEEK
Published Jun 27, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Jul 13, 2009
Josh Eller, a military contractor stationed in Iraq in 2006, was driving through Balad Air Base when he spotted the wild dog. He wasn’t sure what was in its mouth—but when Eller saw two bones, he knew he was looking at a human arm. The dog had pulled the limb from an open-air “burn pit” on the base used to incinerate waste. Eller says it’s “one of the worst things I have seen.”
Since hearing Eller’s story, lawyer Elizabeth Burke has signed on 190 additional clients with complaints about burn pits at 18 military sites in Iraq and Afghanistan. By now, she says, all pits should have been replaced by pollution-controlled incinerators. She’s filed suits in 17 states against KBR, the company contracted to provide waste-disposal services at these bases, accusing it of negligence and harm. Burke was shocked to learn what her clients saw incinerated: Humvees, batteries, unexploded ordnance, gas cans, mattresses, rocket pods, and plastic and medical waste (including body parts, which may explain the arm). Fumes containing carcinogenic dioxins, heavy metals, and particulates, according to an Army–Air Force risk assessment, waft freely across bases.
Burke’s plaintiffs mostly suffer from chronic or unusual medical complications that they believe were caused by burn-pit exposure. Shawn Sheridan, who served two tours at Balad, says black smoke from the pit was so thick at times he couldn’t see through it with night–vision goggles. Sheridan, 26, was healthy when he enlisted six years ago. Now he has a kidney disease, chronic bronchitis, and a painful skin condition.
KBR won’t discuss burn pits while it reviews the suits. A spokeswoman e-mails that KBR isn’t responsible for the Balad pit (Burke alleges it is) and that “any burn pit operated in Iraq or Afghanistan is done pursuant to Army guidelines.” But Kevin Robbins, a former KBR employee who ran a pit near Al Kut, says he got no guidelines on what could be burned when he arrived.
The May 2008 risk assessment of the Balad pit suggested “as much as several hundred tons” of waste was burned each day, but CentCom tells NEWSWEEK it’s now down to about 54 tons. The report found allowable levels of toxins in its air samples. Still, two members of Congress have introduced a bill instructing the DOD to end the practice and monitor the health of service members exposed to fumes. “We certainly would not allow these burn pits in our own country,” says Rep. Tim Bishop. (Click HERE for the original article)
I have almost 60 Burn Pit pics in my Flickr that people have sent me. Click HERE to see those.
Military Times
By Kelly Kennedy – Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Jun 10, 2009 20:03:12 EDT
Sponsors of a bill aimed at more tightly regulating the use of open-air burn pits for waste disposal in Iraq and Afghanistan will hold a news conference Thursday to highlight the effects on troops of possible exposure to toxins from burn-pit smoke.
“There is mounting evidence that veterans may be ill — and some may have actually died — as a result of exposure to dangerous toxins produced by the pits,” Rep. Tim Bishop, D-N.Y., said in a statement. Bishop co-sponsored the bill with Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H.
The news conference will feature veterans who say they were sickened by the plumes, as well as an epidemiologist who specializes in the health risks associated with exposure to burn pits, which are used at bases throughout Iraq and Afghanistan. (more…)
25 of 41 ordered incinerators are now in place on Iraq bases
10 Iraq-bound units nixed after troop relocations
By Joseph Giordono, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Sunday, May 3, 2009
The U.S. military now has 25 operational solid waste incinerators on bases in Iraq out of 41 ordered more than four years ago.
According to officials with Multi-National Corps—Iraq, three more incinerators are being installed, two are “on hold” and 10 are not being installed because of a decline in the number of troops at those bases. One other incinerator has been constructed, dismantled and is being relocated.
The lack of incinerators and the open burning of all manner of trash on bases in Iraq and Afghanistan are at the heart of a series of lawsuits filed in several states last week. The suits accuse defense contractor KBR of knowingly endangering troops and contractors with toxic fumes.
KBR has denied the allegations.
Last summer, military officials told Stars and Stripes that only 17 of the incinerators were in operation. There are eight on Camp Liberty, three at Balad and two at Al Asad, among other locations. Two incinerators are under construction at Kalsu and one more is being built at Balad.
Bases that have had their projects canceled include Ramadi, Speicher and Sykes.
Despite serious health concerns over the widespread open-air burning of trash at U.S. bases in Iraq and Afghanistan, plumes of smoke continue to rise over even the military’s most settled facilities.
Contractual issues were blamed for the slow installation of the incinerators, which release lower levels of pollutants into the air. The incinerators, officials said, burn trash at a far higher temperature than open pits and are considered safer to people’s health.
A pair of government documents obtained by Stars and Stripes last year painted the problem in two very different lights. One document, a December 2006 memo by an Air Force environmental engineer at Balad Air Base, called the situation “an acute health hazard.”
But a study by the U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine and the U.S. Air Force Institute for Operational Health completed in 2008 found that after four months of air sampling in late 2007, the risks to servicemembers’ health were not above the norm.
Some U.S. officers who have been assigned to Iraq, meanwhile, have expressed frustration over the slow pace at which the incinerators have been brought on line.
The “fix should not be years, but more in the order of months,” Air Force Reserve Lt. Col. Darrin Curtis, an environmental engineer, wrote in a December 2006 memo while stationed at Balad.
“In my professional opinion, there is an acute health hazard for individuals,” he wrote. “Burn pits may have been an acceptable practice in the past; however, today’s solid waste contains materials that were not present in the past.”
Of particular concern are the large volume of plastic water bottles that make their way to the burn pit, as well as metals and chemically treated wood products.
A study released last May by researchers at Vanderbilt University found that 29 of 56 Fort Campbell, Ky.-based soldiers surveyed were diagnosed with bronchiolitis, an infectious disease of the lower respiratory tract, after returning from Iraq in 2003. The military said many of those soldiers were exposed to a sulfur fire near Mosul, but researchers found that others had no clear exposure history.
Meanwhile, a study of more than 6,000 Iraq war veterans by researchers at a Department of Veterans Affairs medical center in New York found that about 10 percent of returning troops suffered from nasal allergies, a rate roughly twice that of troops stationed in the United States.
Thirteen percent of U.S. Army medical visits in Iraq are now for new allergies, asthma and other respiratory problems, according to that study, which was released in March. (Click HERE for original article)
WASHINGTON, April 28 /PRNewswire/ — Nine new lawsuits allege that KBR, Inc. jeopardized the health and safety of American soldiers and contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan by burning vast quantities of unsorted waste in enormous open-air burn pits with no safety controls.
The lawsuits are being filed today and Wednesday in state courts in Alabama, California, Georgia, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, and Wyoming by the Burke O’Neil LLC law firm and co-counsel on behalf of 21 named current and former military personnel, private contractors, and the families of men who allegedly died as a result of exposure to toxic emissions from KBR burn pits.
KBR is accused of allowing thick, noxious smoke – coming off of flames sometimes colored blue or green by burning chemicals – to hang over U.S. bases and camps across Iraq and Afghanistan since 2004. Round-the-clock hazardous emissions from the burn pits allegedly caused serious respiratory illnesses, tumors and cancers in the plaintiffs.
According to the complaints, “U.S. soldiers and other residents of the military bases and camps have become seriously ill, been diagnosed with serious and potentially fatal diseases and in some cases have died from the physical injuries and diseases caused by the exposure to hazardous smoke and fumes.”
The burn pits are so large that tractors are used to push waste onto them and the flames shoot hundreds of feet into the sky, according to the lawsuits. KBR allegedly burned waste such as biohazard materials including human corpses, medical supplies, paints, solvents, asbestos, items containing pesticides, animal carcasses, tires, lithium batteries, styrofoam, wood, rubber, medical waste, large amounts of plastics, and even entire trucks.
Attorney Elizabeth Burke, of Burke O’Neil LLC, stated, “KBR knew or should have known that operating vast open-air burn pits jeopardized the health and safety of thousands of Americans. The hazards of operating large open air burn pits were well known. KBR showed an utter disregard for the safety of the troops when they chose to use open air burn pits and failed to use incinerators and other safer methods of waste disposal.”
The collective claims against the defendants include wrongful death, negligence, battery, breach of duty to warn, medical monitoring, future medical expenses, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and breach of contract.
The legal team for the plaintiffs intends to seek class certification of the lawsuits to cover costs of medical monitoring, future medical expenses, and other damages for other individuals exposed to KBR burn pit emissions.
Ms. Burke stated, “KBR promised to minimize the environmental effects of the burn sites they operated in Iraq and Afghanistan and to minimize smoke exposure to people in and near the bases and camps. Instead, by forsaking safety for money, KBR willfully endangered these men and women who honorably served their country in military service or in support of the military.” (Click HERE to read the entire article and see a partial list of plaintiffs.)
I have to say that last statement by Ms. Burke is powerful and hits the nail on the head. That’s why I bolded it!! The “dump” in the Green Zone burned 24/7 covering KBR’s Camp Hope in smoke and ash. Our complaints were ignored. It wasn’t until a Marine check point was set up near “the dump” and the Marines had it shut down and moved for the safety of their troops. Thank God we no longer had to breathe the fumes of thousands of burning plastic water bottles and who know what else. Hoo Ra!
I have nearly 60 Burn Pit photos on Flickr. Click HERE to see those and my other stuff if you want.
Burning Toxic Waste is Making U.S. Soldiers and Iraqis Sick, But the Pentagon Refuses to Admit It
By Nora Eisenberg, AlterNet. Posted March 18, 2009.
Six years into the war, many U.S. bases in Iraq are still without incinerators, leaving open pits spewing toxic plumes over soldiers and civilians.
Acetaldehyde, Acrolien, Arsenic, Benzene, Carbon Monoxide, Ethylbenzene, Formaldehyde, Hydrogen Cyanide, Hydrogen Fluoride, Phosgene, Sulfur Dioxide, Sulfuric Acid, Toluene, Trichloroethane, Xylene. These are just some of the chemicals detected in smoke from the Balad Burn Pit, one of the many vast open pits spewing toxic plumes over Iraq and Afghanistan.
But not to worry; In “Just the Facts,” an information sheet for troops, the Department of Defense has stated that “the potential short- and long-term risks” from Balad “were estimated to be low.” The VA has just announced it will monitor reports of veterans’ pit-related illness. But the DoD has yet to declassify old air sample reports or issue current findings.
The Pentagon’s fact sheet appeared after VAWatchdog.com linked to a memo showing that, as early as 2006, the DoD had known that the pit was “an acute health hazard.” In the memo, titled “Burn Pit Health Hazards,” Air Force Bioenvironmental Engineering Flight Commander Darrin Curtis wrote to authorities that he found it “amazing that the burn pit has been able to operate without restrictions over the past few years without significant engineering controls being put in place.” In an accompanying memo, James R. Elliott, Chief of Air Force Aeromedical Services, concurred that the pit’s fumes contained “known carcinogens” and “respiratory sensitizers” that posed a “chronic and acute health hazard to our troops and the local population.”
“Iraqi Crud” and “Black Goop”
This week, the same memo was boldly posted on Wikileaks, more widely publicizing toxic exposure and governmental neglect. The evidence is clear. The Balad Burn pit is a Big Bad Burn Pit which burns most anything that comes its way including medical waste, styrofoam, and plastic. Soldiers, contractors, foreign workers, and Iraqis suffer what troops call “Iraqi crud,” whose symptoms include a hacking cough and black phlegm that goes by the name “black goop.” According to Army Times reporter Kelley Kennedy, “Though military officials say there are no known long-term effects from exposure to burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan, more than 100 service members have come forward to Military Times and Disabled American Veterans with strikingly similar symptoms: chronic bronchitis, asthma, sleep apnea, chronic coughs and allergy-like symptoms. Several also have cited heart problems, lymphoma and leukemia.” Kevin Wilkins, an Air Force reservist, died last year after returning home from a tour of Balad and Qatar; his wife blames the pit. A year after working at Balad as a nurse, Wilkens was admitted to the hospital for a relentless headache and vomiting, symptoms that began in country. He was diagnosed with a brain tumor and died a week later.
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin) has taken up the cause. Six years into the war in Iraq, many bases are still without incinerators. In Afghanistan, U.S. bases have no incinerators. General David Petraeus claims the Pentagon is employing more incinerators, but that burn pits go with the territory: “There is and will continue to be a need for burn pits during contingency operations,” Petraeus wrote to Feingold.
Denial and Obfuscation
Dr. Michael Kilpatrick, a spokesman for the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, claims the DoD carefully samples air at Balad and other bases with burn pits and all is well. “The bottom line on all of this sampling is that we have not identified anything, where there are troops, where it would have been hazardous to their health,” Kilpatrick said.
Take it from where it comes. Between 1997 and 2002, Michael Kilpatrick directed the Office of the Special Assistant for Gulf War Illness, where his main purpose seemed to be to promote stress — and only stress — as the link between wartime experience and veterans illness. In those five years, he spent $250 “without publishing any medical research report or offering a single treatment program for ill GW veterans,” according to veterans advocate Steve Robinson. According to the General Accounting Office (GAO), Kilpatrick’s fixed position discouraged scientists from applying for grants for research on Gulf War illness, leaving pioneering work, such as that by Dr. Robert Haley, to rely on private funding. Despite compelling finding as early as 1998, that Gulf War illness was caused by brain damage from neurotoxins, Kilpatrick insisted that veterans’ headaches, dizziness, fatigue, bone and joint pain, memory loss, poor concentration, muscle weakness, skin rashes and sores, and gastrointestinal problems, and even amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) could be linked only to stress. Since then, Kilpatrick has gone on to use his medical credential to discount the dangers of depleted uranium, hide the DoD’s non-compliance with pre- and post-deployment screening, and obfuscate the facts around distribution of anti-nerve gas pre-treatment pills, a major cause of Gulf War illness. And now he’s whitewashing Balad’s black fumes and “black goop”
The KBR Connection: Will There Be Accountability?
One Georgia man is having none Dr. Kilpatrick’s reassurances. In November, Joshua Eller, a civilian draftman, initiated what he hopes will be a class action suit against contractor KBR and its former parent company, Halliburton, for exposing people at the Balad base to unsafe water, food and hazardous burn pit fumes.
The suit claims that “all across Iraq and … not confined to Balad” KBR provided bathing water that was not disinfected, including according to former KBR employee testimony, water from the Euphrates and Tigris rivers that was polluted with sewage. Regularly, KBR served soldiers spoiled, expired and rotten food and used dishes that may have been contaminated with shrapnel. The lawsuit claims that the plaintiff suffers from chronic skin lesions, abdominal distress, and nightmares.
KBR dumped medical waste, including needles, bandages, and body parts in the open pit. On one occasion,” the suit states, the plaintiff “witnessed a wild dog running around base with a human arm in its mouth.
Nora Eisenberg is the director of the City University of New York’s fellowship program for emerging scholars. Her short stories, essays and reviews have appeared in such places as The Partisan Review, The Village Voice, The Los Angeles Times and Tikkun. When You Come Home, her new novel, which explores the the 1991 Gulf War and Gulf War illness, will be published this month by Curbstone Press. (Click HERE to read the original article)
Amy Rippel | Special To The Sentinel
February 17, 2009
EUSTIS – When Jill Wilkins filed a veteran’s-death claim in December after her husband — an Air Force reservist who served in Iraq — died from a brain tumor, she assumed it would take months to process.
The Eustis woman was shocked when the claim was approved a mere 21 days later, in early January.
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs determined that Kevin Wilkins’ family is entitled to service-connected death benefits. But a bigger question remains unanswered: Was Kevin Wilkins’ brain tumor the result of exposure to burn pits in Iraq?
That question may take months, if not years, to be answered, according to Jill Wilkins and federal officials.
Still, Jill Wilkins said she is proud of the work her husband did and grateful to get some financial and education assistance as a result of his service.
“If he had died two days later, it would have been a whole different ball game,” she said. “As fortunate as I am in my situation, what about the others? Because we know they’re out there and they’re sick.”
Locally, Kevin Wilkins worked as a nurse at Florida Hospital Waterman in the ambulatory surgical unit and the emergency room. Before that he worked in the emergency room at Ormond Beach Memorial Hospital.
He was a member of the 920th Aeromedical Staging Squadron at Patrick Air Force Base, where he served as a Critical Care Air Transport Teams nurse. He was deployed twice — to Balad from May to August 2006 and then to Qatar from January to April 3, 2007.
He was hospitalized on March 26 with blinding headaches and vomiting, and diagnosed with a brain tumor. He died six days later, on April 1, at age 51.
While hospitalized, he told doctors that his headaches started in early 2007. In the hospital, a doctor asked Kevin whether he had been in contact with chemicals in Iraq. He explained that the burn pits were used to burn trash, including medical waste, plastics and chemicals, Jill Wilkins said.
Jill Wilkins started questioning the safety of the burn pits after reviewing a December 2006 report completed by the U.S. Air Force that called the burn pits in Balad an “operational health risk.”
However, a 2007 Air Force report contradicts the earlier report by saying testing has shown the pits at Balad pose no significant health risk.
At the urging of friends, Wilkins filed the death-benefits claim with the Department of Veterans Affairs on Dec. 17.
Collette Burgess, a Veterans Affairs assistant veterans services center manager, said approving benefits for Wilkins had nothing to do with possible exposure to burn pits.
She said that the brain tumor was a “presumptive disability.” Because a tumor is typically slow progressing, it was assumed that Wilkins had it when he was on active duty. And because he died within one year of service, his family was entitled to service-connected death benefits.
“Presumably, the brain tumor was there while he was on active duty,” Burgess said.
As part of the death benefits, Wilkins and her two teenage children will get educational assistance, among other things. Jill Wilkins said even though her struggle for benefits has ended, she will continue to help others who face similar problems.
“I’m so excited and I feel blessed that it happened in such a short time that I almost feel it’s my responsibility to try to find others who are struggling with the system,” she said. “I’m trying to figure out how to do that.”
Kerry Baker of Disabled American Veterans said he has heard from hundreds of Iraq war veterans who said they have disabilities caused from burn-pit exposure. But the issue is just now reaching the radar screens of public officials and legislators.
“It’s a brand-new subject even though it’s been going on for a long time,” said Baker, the DAV’s associate national legislative director in Washington, D.C.
He said it’s going to take people like Wilkins to come forward and tell their stories for more attention to be paid.
“We don’t want this to take another 20 years, like Vietnam and the Gulf War,” he said of helping troops exposed to toxins released from the burn pits. “We know what they’ve been exposed to.” (click HERE to read the original article)
Jill-It has been an absolute pleasure working with you. Kudo’s to you!!!
Kelly Kennedy – Staff writer
Army Times
Posted : Wednesday Feb 4, 2009
Seven members of Congress have added their names to a growing list of legislators concerned about service members who say burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan have made them sick.
“It has come to our attention that a growing number of veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan are becoming sick and dying from what appears to be overexposure to dangerous toxins produced by burn pits used to destroy waste,” reads a letter from Rep. Tim Bishop, D-N.Y., to Eric Shinseki, the new secretary of veterans affairs. “Further conversations with other veterans have revealed that the armed forces have not investigated this threat adequately.”
Bishop’s office sent the letter Monday. It was also signed by Reps. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore.; Bill Delahunt, D-Mass.; Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y.; Keith Ellison, D-Minn.; Sander Levin, D-Mich.; and Allyson Schwartz, D-Pa.
Congress first heard about the issue, the letter states, after a series of stories came out in Military Times showing that service members were exposed to everything from burning petroleum products to plastics to batteries in burn pits used to dispose of waste at every base in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Tests showed the fires released dioxins, benzene and volatile organic compounds, including substances known to cause cancer. So far, 150 people have contacted Disabled American Veterans to say they are sick, and they believe the burn pits caused their ailments.
Of those 150, about 30 have lymphoma and leukemia. Other reported conditions include asthma, bronchitis, sleep apnea, chronic coughs, allergy-like symptoms and heart problems.
“After years of helping veterans of the Vietnam and Gulf wars cope with the health effects of toxic battlefields, we have learned that we must take exposures to toxins seriously to ensure that this generation of service members does not face the same difficulties,” the letter states.
The lawmakers ask Shinseki to use the Gulf War Advisory Committee to “investigate the combined effect of sand, burn pits, dioxins, benzene and volatile organic compounds” on veterans. They also want VA to compile statistics for the toxin levels in the blood of those who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan compared to those who have not.
And they ask that VA notify its doctors that “veterans have been exposed to chemicals from fires in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
Meanwhile, Burke O’Neil LLC, a Washington, D.C., law firm that has filed a class-action lawsuit against defense contractor Kellogg, Brown & Root LLC for improperly disposing of waste and insufficiently sanitizing water supplies for U.S. troops in Iraq, has invited the 150 ill service members to join the suit, said Kerry Baker, DAV’s assistant legislative director.
So far, about 30 have done so, according to Elizabeth Burke, a lawyer with the firm, which plans to file its suit soon.
Burke O’Neil also filed a third class-action suit in Montgomery County, Md., dated Jan. 21, focusing on the way KBR disposed of waste in burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan after several people came forward with cancer that they believe came from exposure to the burn pits, Burke said.
The lawsuit states that KBR “illegally burned biohazard materials, hydraulic fluids, lithium batteries and other hazardous materials in the open-air burn pits, causing noxious and unsafe smoke to drift over the base. Defendants burned tires, trucks, munitions boxes, and items containing pesticide residue.”
The suit accuses KBR of negligence, battery, nuisance, negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress, product liability, willful and wanton conduct, negligent hiring, breach of duty to warn, and medical monitoring.
It asks for compensation for physical injuries, emotional distress, fear of future disease, and need for continued medical treatment and monitoring. It also asks that KBR be stripped of all revenue for the contracts the plaintiffs say the company violated.
Four plaintiffs have chronic respiratory illnesses, one has “weeping lesions” on his arms and feet, one has gastrointestinal illness, and one has reactive airways disease.
Baker is compiling a list of service members and veterans who believe they were exposed to the burn pits to make a case that VA should compensate people for their illnesses. His e-mail address is kbaker22@comcast.net. (click HERE to go to original article)
Effects of toxic smoke worry troops returning from Iraq
By Adam Levine
December 15, 2008
CNN Supervising Pentagon Producer
WASHINGTON (CNN) — The pervasive smoke spewing from the junk heap at Balad Air Force Base in Iraq is causing many returning troops to be concerned about the effects on their long-term health.
Studies of the smoke from the burn pits suggests it contains dioxin and other toxins.
For four years, the burn pit was a festering dump, spewing acrid smoke over the base, including housing and the hospital.
Until three incinerators were installed, the smelly pit was the only place to dispose of trash, including plastics, food and medical waste.
“At the peak, before they went to use the real industrial incinerators, it was about 500,000 pounds a day of stuff,” according to a transcript of an April 2008 presentation by Dr. Bill Halperin, who heads the Occupational and Environmental Health Subcommittee at the Defense Health Board. “The way it was burned was by putting jet fuel on it.”
A lawsuit filed against the burn pit operators, KBR, by a contractor alleges the burn pit also contained body parts. Watch burn pits spew black smoke »
“Wild dogs in the area raided the burn pit and carried off human remains. The wild dogs could be seen roaming the base with body parts in their mouths,” says the lawsuit filed in Texas federal court.
