thedrifter
03-09-07, 08:32 AM
Friday, March 09, 2007
Nuke test witnesses face compensation denial
The Associated Press
LAS VEGAS -- Thousands of U.S. military personnel who witnessed nuclear bomb explosions at the Nevada Test Site and in the South Pacific should not be required to have their exposures reconstructed in order to receive compensation, an atomic veterans advocate said.
Despite attempts by defense and veterans agencies to estimate external doses of radiation-laced dust and sea water mist, measurements weren't made in many cases of how much soldiers, Marines, sailors and airmen were exposed, R.J. Ritter, commander of the National Association of Atomic Veterans Inc., said Wednesday.
The dose reconstruction effort, like that for civilian Cold War nuclear workers, often results in denials of compensation claims for those who served honorably and were muzzled by secrecy oaths, Ritter told the Veterans' Advisory Board on Dose Reconstruction, meeting in Las Vegas.
Ritter, of Houston, served aboard the USS Tawasa for the 1955 underwater Wigwam atomic test off the coast of San Diego. He recalled that the mess hall was declared off-limits because of high radiation.
"However, after we returned to port, we were told the incident did not happen," he said.
Retired Army Col. George Edwin Taylor, a board member and former nuclear weapons officer, was at the Nevada Test Site for a 1957 atomic blast 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
"During the test we were prone in trenches, with gas masks, ponchos, steel helmets and our hands covering our eyes," Taylor wrote in a statement about his experience.
"The most memorable events during the test were the instantaneous extremely bright light that was blinding, even while in the bottom of a trench with your eyes closed and covered, and followed about five seconds later by the blast which forced you downward even while prone in the bottom of an 8-foot-deep trench."
Taylor said he had a pair of malignant melanoma tumors surgically removed in the 1990s.
Dr. James Zimble, chairman of the veterans advisory board, said the board took seriously Ritter's slide show of atomic tests and military personnel.
The board makes recommendations to its sponsor agencies, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.
Ritter estimated that as many as 500,000 U.S. military and support personnel were exposed to radiation during nuclear weapons tests -- including sailors on ships, pilots who flew planes through radioactive clouds and soldiers and Marines who huddled in trenches at the Nevada Test Site, marched through fallout or landed by parachute in contaminated areas.
Until Congress in 1993 lifted a ban on discussing those missions, atomic veterans were sworn to secrecy, Ritter told the Las Vegas Review-Journal prior to his presentation.
"Secrecy. That's the big issue. With secrecy and deniability how can you go to the VA and seek a claim?" he asked.
Ritter said only a fraction of some 25,000 claims that atomic veterans filed for medical care or compensation since the early 1950s have resulted in payments.
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On the Net:
National Association of Atomic Veterans Inc.: www.naav.com
Veterans' Advisory Board on Dose Reconstruction: www.dtra.mil/ASCO/vadose.cfm
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D4.
Ellie
Nuke test witnesses face compensation denial
The Associated Press
LAS VEGAS -- Thousands of U.S. military personnel who witnessed nuclear bomb explosions at the Nevada Test Site and in the South Pacific should not be required to have their exposures reconstructed in order to receive compensation, an atomic veterans advocate said.
Despite attempts by defense and veterans agencies to estimate external doses of radiation-laced dust and sea water mist, measurements weren't made in many cases of how much soldiers, Marines, sailors and airmen were exposed, R.J. Ritter, commander of the National Association of Atomic Veterans Inc., said Wednesday.
The dose reconstruction effort, like that for civilian Cold War nuclear workers, often results in denials of compensation claims for those who served honorably and were muzzled by secrecy oaths, Ritter told the Veterans' Advisory Board on Dose Reconstruction, meeting in Las Vegas.
Ritter, of Houston, served aboard the USS Tawasa for the 1955 underwater Wigwam atomic test off the coast of San Diego. He recalled that the mess hall was declared off-limits because of high radiation.
"However, after we returned to port, we were told the incident did not happen," he said.
Retired Army Col. George Edwin Taylor, a board member and former nuclear weapons officer, was at the Nevada Test Site for a 1957 atomic blast 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
"During the test we were prone in trenches, with gas masks, ponchos, steel helmets and our hands covering our eyes," Taylor wrote in a statement about his experience.
"The most memorable events during the test were the instantaneous extremely bright light that was blinding, even while in the bottom of a trench with your eyes closed and covered, and followed about five seconds later by the blast which forced you downward even while prone in the bottom of an 8-foot-deep trench."
Taylor said he had a pair of malignant melanoma tumors surgically removed in the 1990s.
Dr. James Zimble, chairman of the veterans advisory board, said the board took seriously Ritter's slide show of atomic tests and military personnel.
The board makes recommendations to its sponsor agencies, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.
Ritter estimated that as many as 500,000 U.S. military and support personnel were exposed to radiation during nuclear weapons tests -- including sailors on ships, pilots who flew planes through radioactive clouds and soldiers and Marines who huddled in trenches at the Nevada Test Site, marched through fallout or landed by parachute in contaminated areas.
Until Congress in 1993 lifted a ban on discussing those missions, atomic veterans were sworn to secrecy, Ritter told the Las Vegas Review-Journal prior to his presentation.
"Secrecy. That's the big issue. With secrecy and deniability how can you go to the VA and seek a claim?" he asked.
Ritter said only a fraction of some 25,000 claims that atomic veterans filed for medical care or compensation since the early 1950s have resulted in payments.
------
On the Net:
National Association of Atomic Veterans Inc.: www.naav.com
Veterans' Advisory Board on Dose Reconstruction: www.dtra.mil/ASCO/vadose.cfm
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D4.
Ellie