DoD
Report on Marines’ water omitted cancer chemical
Feb 18th
By KEVIN MAURER–Associated Press–WILMINGTON, N.C. – An environmental contractor dramatically underreported the level of a cancer-causing chemical found in tap water at Camp Lejeune, then omitted it altogether as the Marine base prepared for a federal health review, an Associated Press review has found.
The Marine Corps had been warned nearly a decade earlier about the dangerously high levels of benzene, which was traced to massive leaks from fuel tanks at the base on the North Carolina coast, according to recently disclosed studies.
For years, Marines who served at Camp Lejeune have blamed their families’ cancers and other ailments on tap water tainted by dry cleaning solvents, and many accuse the military of covering it up. The benzene was discovered as part of a broader, ongoing probe into that contamination.
When water was sampled in July 1984, scientists found benzene in a well near the base’s Hadnot Point Fuel Farm at levels of 380 parts per billion, according to a water tests done by a contractor. A year later, in a report summarizing the 1984 sampling, the same contractor pointed out the benzene concentration “far exceeds” the safety limit set by federal regulators at 5 parts per billion.
The Marines were still studying the water contamination in 1991 when another contractor again warned the Navy of the health hazards posed by such levels of benzene.
By 1992, the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease, an arm of the Department of Health and Human Services, showed up at the base to begin a health risk assessment. That’s when a third contractor, the Michael Baker Corp., released a draft report on the feasibility of fixing the overall problem.
In it, the 1984 level on the well of 380 parts per billion had changed to 38 parts per billion. The company’s final report on the well, issued in 1994, made no mention of the benzene.
Not only hasn’t the benzene disappeared from the now-closed wells, it’s gotten much worse over time. One sample from a series of tests conducted from June 2007 to August 2009 registered 3,490 parts per billion, according to a report from a fourth contractor.
Kyla Bennett, who spent 10 years as an enforcement officer for the Environmental Protection Agency before becoming an ecologist and environmental attorney, reviewed the different reports and said it was difficult to conclude innocent mistakes were made in the Baker Corp. documents.
“It is weird that it went from 380 to 38 and then it disappeared entirely,” she said. “It does support the contention that they did do it deliberately.”
News of Baker Corp.’s handling of the benzene levels has ex-Lejeune residents questioning anew the honesty of a military they accuse of endangering their lives.
“It is a shame that an institution founded on honor and integrity would resort to open deceit in order to protect their reputation at the cost of the health, safety and welfare of its service men, women and their families,” said Mike Partain, a 42-year-old who lives in Tallahassee, Fla., but was born at Lejeune and diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007.
Capt. Brian Block, a Marine Corps spokesman, took exception to characterizing the conflicting information in the reports as anything but inadvertent.
“It was probably just a mistake on the part of the contractor, but I can’t tell you for certain why that happened,” he said.
David Higie, a spokesman for Baker Corp., declined to discuss the company’s reports or why its employees might have revised the benzene levels. He referred questions to the military.
Block said Camp Lejeune held a news conference to alert residents of problems with the water system in 1985 and has spent millions of dollars in outreach and studies. “The Marine Corps has never tried to hide any of this information,” he said.
The discrepancies in the reports were tucked inside thousands of documents the Marines released last year to the Agency for Toxic Substances as part of the Marines’ long-running review of water supplied to Camp Lejeune’s main family housing areas. That water was contaminated by fuel and cleaning solvents from the 1950s through the 1980s, and health officials believe as many as 1 million people may have been exposed to the toxins before the wells that supplied the tainted water were closed two decades ago.
The newly discovered records, first reported Sunday by McClatchy News Service, show that a water well contaminated by leaking fuel was left functioning for at least five months after a sampling discovered it was tainted with benzene in 1984.
Benzene, a carcinogen, is a natural part of crude oil and gasoline. Drinking water containing high levels of it can cause vomiting, dizziness, sleepiness, convulsions, and death and long-term exposure damages bone marrow, lowers red blood cells and can cause anemia and leukemia, according to the EPA.
Camp Lejeune environmental engineer Robert Alexander was quoted in 1985 as saying no one “had been directly exposed” to contaminants, including benzene. In December, Alexander told the AP he didn’t recall anything about the well contaminated with the benzene or the ensuing studies that failed to account for its toxicity, but said that the methods at the time were still being perfected, and that he and the other base officials did the best they could.
The records indicate the military knew a lot of specifics.
For years the Marine Corps knew the fuel farm, built in 1941, was leaking 1,500 gallons a month and did nothing to stop it, according to a 1988 memo from a Camp Lejeune lawyer to the base’s assistant facilities manager. “It’s an indefensible waste of money and a continuing potential threat to human health and the environment,” wrote Staff Judge Advocate A.P. Tokarz.
Minutes of a 1996 meeting with Moon Township, Pa.-based Baker Corp., the third contractor, indicate the fuel farm had lost 800,000 gallons of fuel, of which 500,000 gallons had been recovered. Benzene was “in the deeper portion of the aquifer” and the “fuel farm is definitely the source,” the minutes quote a Michael Baker employee as saying.
The Coast Guard categorizes any coastal oil spill larger than 100,000 gallons as major.
Former Marines and Camp Lejeune residents continue to fight for a compensation program and to fund a mortality study that would determine if Marines and sailors who were exposed to these contaminants suffer from a higher death rate. The Senate passed legislation in September backed by Sens. Richard Burr, R-N.C., and Kay Hagan, D-N.C., preventing the military from dismissing claims related to water contamination pending completion of the several studies, including the mortality study.
“These people knowingly exposed us to these high levels of contaminants and now they don’t want to know if their negligence caused harm to the people they say they care so much about?” said Jerry Ensminger, a retired master sergeant who lived at the base and lost his 9-year-old daughter to leukemia. “There is definitely something wrong with this picture.”
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On the Net:
Camp Lejeune water history: http://tinyurl.com/ybpfsc9
Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry: http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/SITES/LEJEUNE
The Few, The Proud, The Forgotten: http://www.tftptf.com
Popularity: 19% [?]
Senate committee to discuss gay ban next week
Jan 29th
The Senate Armed Services Committee will waste no time launching into hearings next week on the possibility of repealing the ban on open military service by homosexuals.
The committee will devote one hour of questioning to that issue when Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen appear on Capitol Hill to discuss President Obama’s 2011 defense budget proposal.
Discussion of the law that bars open service by homosexuals and the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that derives from the law will come at noon Tuesday.
The Senate committee plans additional hearings, but Tuesday’s questioning of Gates and Mullen about whether they support Obama’s initiative to repeal the gay ban and what complications they envision if the law is changed will get the discussions underway.
Popularity: 14% [?]
Increase in suicide rate of veterans noted
Jan 11th
By Kimberly Hefling, AP–Washington
The suicide rate among 18- to 29-year-old men who’ve left the military has gone up significantly, the government said Monday.
The rate for these veterans went up 26 percent from 2005 to 2007, according to preliminary data from the Veterans Affairs Department. It’s assumed that most of the veterans in this age group served in Iraq or Afghanistan.
If there is a bright spot in the data, it’s that in 2007 veterans in the group who used VA health care were less likely to commit suicide than those who did not. That’s a change from 2005.
The military in recent years has struggled as well with an increase in suicides, with the Army seeing a record number last year. While the military frequently releases such data, it has been more difficult to track suicide information on veterans once they’ve left active duty.
The VA calculated the numbers using Centers for Disease Control and Prevention numbers from 16 states. In 2005, the rate per 100,000 veterans among men ages 18-29 was 44.99, compared with 56.77 in 2007, the VA said. It did not release data for other population groups.
The VA and the military have sought to more aggressively tackle the problem in recent years with measures ranging from a suicide hot line to educational campaigns.
At a conference on Monday in Washington dedicated to addressing the issue, VA Secretary Eric Shinseki said his agency needs to do a better job understanding what led to each suicide. He said he’d also like to see more stringent protocol put into place at VA facilities about how to handle a potentially suicide veteran, similar to what’s done with someone who’s having a heart attack.
He noted that of the 30,000 suicides each year in America, about 20 percent are committed by veterans.
“Why do we know so much about suicides but still know so little about how to prevent them?” Shinseki said. “Simple question but we continue to be challenged.”
Popularity: 17% [?]
Suicide Rates Increase Across Military Branches in 2009
Dec 9th
By John M. Donnelly, CQ Staff
More U.S. military personnel have taken their own lives so far in 2009 than have been killed in either the Afghanistan or Iraq wars this year, according to a Congressional Quarterly compilation of the latest statistics from the armed services.
As of Tuesday, at least 334 members of the military services have committed suicide in 2009, compared with 297 killed in Afghanistan and 144 who died in Iraq, the figures show.
Lawmakers in recent years have been increasingly concerned about the growing problem of military suicides, especially in the Army. They have been holding hearings, passing bills and approving billions of dollars more than requested to improve mental health care for military personnel and veterans.
But even those who have been most intensely focused on the issue said they found the new numbers alarming. So far in 2009, the Army has had 211 of the 334 suicides, while the Navy had 47, the Air Force had 34 and the Marine Corps (active duty only) had 42.
“These numbers are just staggering and, tragically, are an indication that we are simply not doing the job of providing adequate mental health care for both our active-duty service people and our veterans,” said Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee.
Armed forces personnel traditionally have had a much lower suicide rate than the population at large. Because the most recently available national suicide statistics from the Centers for Disease Control are from 2006, it is impossible to know whether the current military rate is higher than the current civilian rate. However, the civilian suicide rate for males ages 20-29 hovered around 20 per 100,000 during the first half of this decade. The Army said its suicide rate is now a bit higher than that for the first time.
Moreover, the total number who have killed themselves in 2009 is probably higher than 334, because the figure does not include unavailable suicide statistics for 2009 for Marine Corps reservists or veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who have left the service.
The veterans’ numbers, in particular, could yet swell the totals considerably. The Department of Veterans Affairs said an average of 53 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans committed suicide each year between 2002 and 2006. And that number only includes suicides among the quarter of all veterans who use the VA’s health system.
The Deployment Connection
The rising number of suicides has coincided with U.S. military forces redeploying frequently to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Army leaders say they are unable to conclude that the deployments are the main cause of the suicide increase — one-third of the active-duty soldiers who killed themselves in 2009 have no deployment history, according to Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Chiarelli.
But many senior members of Congress say they believe there is a connection.
Filner wants to hold hearings soon, saying they would show that the number of casualties in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is much higher than officially acknowledged once psychological wounds are accounted for.
John P. Murtha, D-Pa., chairman of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee and a Marine Corps veteran of Vietnam, attributes the rising mental health problems to a lack of time at home between deployments.
“I’m shocked to hear there’s more suicides than people lost in Afghanistan,” he said, attributing the upward trend to “the stress of a long war where people just don’t have the opportunity to come home to get healed.”
The Army, which accounts for the bulk of the suicides, is taking an aggressive approach to preventing them, through periodic screening and education to get help to those who need it, Chiarelli said at a Nov. 17 press briefing.
“Everyone is distressed at this extremely high rate,” said Gene Taylor, D-Miss., a senior member of House Armed Services. “About the only good thing is that Gen. Chiarelli has focused his efforts on it.”
Congress is aware of the problem and has taken steps to address it, noted Daniel K. Akaka, D-Hawaii, chairman of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee and a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“In the past two years, Congress passed sweeping legislation to address veterans’ mental health issues — from a far reaching omnibus bill to raise VA mental health standards to a suicide prevention hotline,” he said.
The newly enacted fiscal 2010 defense authorization law (PL 111-84), for example, requires significant increases in mental-health providers in all the military services. Chiarelli said the Army needs hundreds more mental-health and substance-abuse counselors than it has.
Filner, meanwhile, has drafted legislation that would require the secretaries of Defense and Veterans Affairs to set up a pilot program to help servicemembers reintegrate in society after they return home from deployments. The program would mandate psychological evaluations and screenings for brain trauma and provide for follow-up care.
Filner is convinced the process of questioning military personnel is not thorough enough and that too much of a stigma is still attached to honestly speaking about emotional problems.
General Population Comparisons
While the gross numbers are of concern, they do not tell the story so much as the rate of increase when compared with suicide rates in the overall population.
The Army and Marine Corps rates used to be lower than the comparable civilian rate. For example, it was 9 per 100,000 among those who had served on active duty in the Army in 2001. But in 2008, by comparison, the Army suicide rate among those who had served on active duty was 20.2 per 100,000 people.
Similarly, the active-duty Marine Corps rate in 2008 was 19.5 per 100,000 or just shy of the most recent civilian rate statistics available. It had been much less of a problem just a few years ago, going as low as 12.5 per 100,000 in 2002, Marine Corps figures show.
The suicide problem is expected to become more prominent as the debate continues over deployments in Afghanistan. As the public grows more restive about continued warfare on two fronts, lawmakers will be under pressure to address those concerns, and the political pressure will grow as next year’s midterm elections get closer.
The deployments to Afghanistan will probably only grow in the months ahead. President Obama is expected to announce next week that the U.S. force of about 68,000 in Afghanistan will swell next year, perhaps by 50 percent. Meanwhile, the approximately 115,000 U.S. forces in Iraq will go down to 50,000, but not until August 2010.
Source: CQ Today Online News
Round-the-clock coverage of news from Capitol Hill.
© 2009 Congressional Quarterly Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Popularity: 30% [?]
Army’s record suicide rate ‘horrible,’ general says
Nov 18th
Despite high total, awareness campaign shows signs of helping
By Ann Scott Tyson–Washington Post Staff Writer–
Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli on Tuesday called the Army’s record suicide rate this year “horrible” and said the problem of soldiers taking their own lives is the toughest he has faced in his 37 years in service.
As of Nov. 16, 140 soldiers on active duty and 71 soldiers not on active duty were suspected to have committed suicide. “We are almost certainly going to end the year higher than last year,” which was also a record for Army suicides, Chiarelli said at a Pentagon news conference.
“This is horrible,” he said. “Every single loss is devastating.”
However, Chiarelli, who has made suicide prevention a priority, said that despite the high total, the monthly suicide rate has largely declined since March.
In January and February, there were about 40 suicides, or about one-third of the active-duty total this year, and since March the general trend has been down, with the exception of a couple of months, he said. He attributed that progress primarily to a campaign to increase the involvement of Army leaders at all ranks in suicide prevention efforts.
Chiarelli voiced frustration that the Army has not yet been able to identify any causal links among the suicide cases, except that soldiers are more likely to kill themselves when they are away from their stations, where help is available. “There is no simple answer,” he said. “Each suicide case is as unique as the individuals themselves.”
Popularity: 13% [?]
Army to test electric tactical vehicle
Nov 8th
Staff writer–Military Times 
Electricity has been the military’s fuel of choice for the very large (2,500-ton submarines) and the very small (12-pound unmanned aerial vehicles), but not for the vast middle ground of tactical vehicles.
A vehicle maker hopes to change that with the HEMTT-A3, a hulking hybrid truck. Oshkosh Corp. says the vehicle consumes 20 percent less fuel, requires less maintenance than current trucks and can double as a power source for field hospitals or command centers.
Dubbed the “heavy expanded mobility tactical truck,” the vehicle is headed to Army proving grounds this fall to undergo durability, reliability and performance tests.
The U.S. has spent years testing vehicles that run in part or entirely on electricity, said Paul Skalny, director of the Army’s National Automotive Center. So far, the service has not embraced them.
The Army has a few hybrid electric Humvees for testing — “probably less than 10,” Skalny said. And it has tested hybrid utility vehicles, maneuver vehicles and fuel-cell-powered vehicles.
But they haven’t generated wide enthusiasm
Popularity: 11% [?]
Arlington officials can’t get their stories straight
Nov 5th
The superintendent says he may have been absent when remains were moved, but an
employee’s log says otherwise
By Mark Benjamin–Salon.com–
Editor’s note: This story is part of a special Salon investigation of problems at Arlington National Cemetery.The top official at Arlington National Cemetery claims he was unaware of the most recently reported burial error at the cemetery, possibly, he says, because he was away at the time it occurred. Cemetery employee records, however, show Superintendent John Metzler present and working at Arlington when the cemetery discovered this most recently disclosed burial foul-up, which resulted in digging up and moving the remains of one service member the cemetery had accidentally buried on top of another.
Arlington officials also continue to struggle to locate key paperwork that must be completed when remains are moved. The paperwork would confirm that Grabe’s remains were moved and explain the circumstances surrounding that decision. The Army, which oversees Arlington, has been unable to locate any such documents.
The still-missing burial paperwork adds to the mounting evidence suggesting that top Arlington officials may have disregarded cemetery rules in this case. The explanation from Metzler, meanwhile, raises serious questions about the conduct of top cemetery officials with respect to repeated burial mix-ups at Arlington. Cemetery officials have already established a pattern of incomplete, inconsistent or contradictory responses when asked by Salon to account for misplaced or misidentified remains at the cemetery.
Popularity: 8% [?]
Army: 7 dead in dual attacks at Fort Hood, Texas
Nov 5th
AP–WASHINGTON — The Army says seven people were killed and 20 wounded in a pair of shootings at the Fort Hood Army base in Texas.
An Army spokesman at the Pentagon says the shootings began about 1:30 p.m. Thursday at a personnel and medical processing center at Fort Hood.
The spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Banks, says two shooters were apparently involved. There is no word yet on who they were, nor on identities of the dead.
Banks says the second incident took place at a theater on the sprawling base.
He says it is too soon to tell whether there is any link to battle stress or repeated deployments. The Army is suffering a record high suicide rate and other signs of stress from fighting two wars.
Popularity: 19% [?]
Most U.S. youths unfit to serve, data show
Nov 4th
75 percent of the nation’s 17- to 24-year-olds are ineligible for service for a variety
of reasons.
By William H. McMichael–Military Times
U.S. military-age youth are increasingly unfit to serve — mostly because they’re in such lousy shape.
According to the latest Pentagon figures, a full 35 percent, or more than one-third, of the roughly 31.2 million Americans aged 17 to 24 are unqualified for military service because of physical and medical issues. And, said Curt Gilroy, the Pentagon’s director of accessions, “the major component of this is obesity. We have an obesity crisis in the country. There’s no question about it.”
The Pentagon draws its data from the Centers for Disease Control, which regularly tracks obesity. The steadily rising trend is not good news for military recruiters, despite their recent successes, nor for the overall health of the U.S. population.
In 1987, according to the CDC, a mere 6 percent of 18- to 34-year-olds, or about 1 out of 20, were obese. In 2008, 22 years later, 23 percent of that age group — almost 1 out of 4 — was considered to be obese.
Popularity: 15% [?]
Some states weigh earlier primaries in 2010 to accommodate Americans abroad
Oct 30th
Troops are among those affected by new rule on ballot deadlines
By Associated Press
ST. PAUL, MINN. — A new law meant to protect the voting rights of deployed troops and other Americans overseas is forcing at least a dozen states to consider holding their primaries earlier or to negotiate another plan that federal officials will accept.
Ballots must be sent to certain voters at least 45 days before an election, under a requirement included in a major defense bill signed Wednesday by President Obama. It leaves states with primaries in August and September next year in a pickle, because the deadline for distributing November ballots will have passed by the time many will have certified the results of their primaries.
“You can’t print a ballot until you know who won,” said Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, who is urging his state’s lawmakers to shift the Sept. 14 primary by at least a month. “And you can’t print ballots in five seconds. It takes several days to print a ballot. Then you have to put them in the mail.”
Some states have said they may seek a waiver to avoid moving their elections. Although faxing and e-mailing ballots to overseas voters might be one solution, one congressman who supports the deadline said the goal should be to keep standards as uniform as possible.
Popularity: 6% [?]
