Sidebars to Deadly Dependence

By Barry Yeoman

SIDEBAR 1: Authorities work to clean up spills

IN 1983, WORKERS AT MARIETTA'S AIR FORCE PLANT 6 were transferring the degreasing solvent trichloroethylene (TCE) from a rail car to an on-site storage tank when the ground started moving—literally. TCE dissolves asphalt, and that's what was happening: More than 1,000 gallons of the cancer-causing chemical had slopped onto the ground when someone disconnected a line and didn't tell anyone.

It was the worst chemical spill ever at the facility, which is owned by the Defense Department and leased to Lockheed Martin to manufacture military aircraft such as C-130 cargo planes. But it was hardly the only release. From the time the plant was reopened in 1951—after a brief run during World War II—industrial contaminants were being released into the soil, sometimes intentionally. "There were no hazardous waste regulations back then," says Amy Potter, an environmental engineer with the Georgia Environmental Protection Division. "Basically, the common practice was to open up the back door and throw it out. They would take drums of waste and put it in the landfill." Rusted, leaking pipes and chemical runoff added to the toxic mess.

However the chemicals escaped, the result was a contamination plume that has since migrated off the plant's 923-acre property and into the surrounding Cobb County community. TCE has gotten into nearby groundwater, seeping into fractures in the bedrock and polluting local water supplies, say state officials. After contaminants were found at nearby Southern Polytechnic State University, Lockheed began to supply the campus with clean water for irrigation. Next door to the university, Lockheed has also provided Life College, a chiropractic school, with drinking water. Pollutants have seeped into Rottenwood Creek, which dumps into the Chattahoochee River, Atlanta's drinking water supply. The Rottenwood Creek contamination is not at levels considered dangerous, but because of the area's complex geology, neither the military nor state regulators know the extent of the damage. "A lot of the work out there is trying to find where the contamination is, because it's fractured rock," says Jim Ussery, a program manager at the Environmental Protection Division. "It's very complicated. As we have found [tainted] wells, we've closed them down."

The military says it's working to clean up the mess, even before it learns the full extent of the problem. According to Bill Brown, the Air Force's restoration program manager for Plant 6, his outfit is pumping out groundwater, then treating it with activated carbon to remove organic compounds like TCE. It is also using a chemical called potassium permanganate to break down poisons in the soil. Roger Lee, Lockheed's environmental resources manager at Plant 6, says the facility has dramatically reduced its use of toxic materials—from 1,300 tons in 1988 to less than 30 tons today. TCE has been eliminated completely.

State regulators agree the Air Force and Lockheed have been cooperative. "A lot of people have told them they'd never be able to clean it up," says Potter. "They said, 'We want to try,' and they're still going at it." She pauses, considering the extent of the contamination. "We'll be working on it," she adds, "for years."

SIDEBAR 2: Down Under

IN FEBRUARY 1999, AN OFFICIAL FROM TAMPA'S MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE came to a California meeting with an environmental mystery. "We have two ditches that fill with water occasionally," explained Mark Canfield, MacDill's remedial project manager. "The bottom 8 inches of water are a 'safety yellow' color and the top 4 inches are clear." As he showed his colleagues photographs of the ditches, Canfield explained that the yellow material only appears periodically, and never affects nearby ditches. When he tested the water, Canfield found two alarming substances: thiodiglycolic acid and elemental sulfur. Both are breakdown elements of sulfur mustard agent, a chemical weapon that burns the skin and blisters the respiratory passages. Now banned by the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993, sulfur mustard can cause respiratory cancer. Intense exposure can lead to death.

MacDill is not alone, of course, in chemical-weapons contamination. According to the Defense Department, bases across the nation started burying leaking and obsolete chemical warfare materiel during World War I, believing that to be the safest way to dispose of the poisons. While this was considered "an acceptable method of disposal," says one Army memo, the result was sometimes "incomplete and/or partial destruction." The Pentagon is now struggling with what to do with these toxic sites.

Covering 5,631 acres at the tip of the Interbay Peninsula, MacDill was used for chemical-weapons training starting in the 1940s. "Have you ever seen the videos where it's an old wooden building where they release chemical agent and [the soldiers] have a small amount of time to put their masks on? That's what it was," says Capt. Danny Cooper, a base spokesman. The agents, which Cooper says were not weapons grade, were stored in a "toxic gas yard" consisting of four "igloos" and seven other structures. Chemical materiel was buried in a base landfill. MacDill was also reported to be the site of a 500-pound bomb filled with mustard gas and buried near a mangrove swamp, though the actual bomb has never been located.

MacDill's chemical-weapons sites were located at the southernmost point of the base. According to the Air Force, the groundwater at these sites is now contaminated with arsenic, cyanide and lead. It also contains thiodiglycol, a sulfur mustard breakdown product; toluene, a lethal chemical that affects the nervous system and kidneys; and chloroacetic acid, which is used in the manufacture of thiodiglycolic acid and has been linked to intestinal perforation and depression of the central nervous system. MacDill's soils and sediment contain a similar toxic stew.

Numerous studies of potentially contaminated sites have been conducted at MacDill over the last two decades. Though contamination is generally thought to be minor, the relative risk at two sites mapped in 2002 and 2003 -- the reputed bomb burial area and the toxic gas yard -- is rated as "high." Human contact with the affected area is limited to "a very few people who work out there from day to day," says Capt. Cooper. The Pentagon expects to complete the cleanup by 2021.

By contrast, the Army Corps of Engineers has closed the books on another Bay area hot spot, the Hernando County Airport. Located 40 miles northeast of Tampa, the airport is the former home of the Brooksville Army Airfield, which was built as an auxiliary to MacDill in 1943 and used for chemical-weapons testing. Mustard bombs were loaded onto a plane at Brooksville and dropped in nearby woods (now Withlacoochee State Forest) to see how the agent pierced the canopy and spread. According to historical documents and media reports, 127 canisters of mustard agent were buried and burned at the Brooksville site. (One soldier shot at the burning mess, only to have it splash back at him.) A 55-gallon drum of thickened mustard agent was also disposed there. In 1963, tests found the soil contaminated with chemical agents, and according to the Army Corps of Engineers, "there exists no evidence... that any significant cleanup had been performed."

All told, 1,000 pounds of chemical munitions might be buried at Brooksville. But when the Army Corps of Engineers excavated three areas last year, it found nothing. "They consider the airport to have no munitions left behind," says airport director Don Silvernell.

Army Corps spokesperson Cindy Foley warns, though, that chemical agents might well be present at Hernando County Airport. "The Corps was handicapped by a lack of information on how the Department of Defense used the property," she says. "There may be hazards that we just don't know. We never, ever consider a site absolutely safe."

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