Hearing includes bad wells

[thedrifter]

June 11, 2007 - 12:00AM
Hearing includes bad wells

JOE MILLER
DAILY NEWS STAFF
Retired Marine Jerome Ensminger feels the Marine Corps hasn't done enough for what he believes are as many as 500,000 people exposed to contaminated drinking water aboard Camp Lejeune.

Ensminger of Richlands plans to take those feelings to Capitol Hill on Tuesday. He is scheduled to testify before a House subcommittee on oversight and investigations during a special hearing to discuss the contaminated drinking water controversy.

Chemicals trichloroethylene (TCE) and tetrachloroethylene (PCE) were first found in the drinking water on base in the 1980s. All polluted wells were shut down in 1985.

The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry Web site states that the Marine Corps first learned of the problems in 1982 when officials sampled drinking water from the Hadnot Point system. Volatile organic compounds (VOCs), TCE and PCE were found in the Hadnot Point and Tarawa Terrace water distribution systems.

The agency said the contamination came partially from ABC One-Hour Cleaners located near the base and a combination of industrial operations, past wastewater disposal standards and practices and leaking underground storage tanks.

Ensminger lost his daughter, Janey, in 1985 at the age of 9 to leukemia. He believes the contaminated water caused his daughter's untimely death.

"Every day, there are people contacting me that either their children or their spouse or themselves have been diagnosed with either kidney cancer or liver cancer or non-Hodgkin's lymphoma," he said. "All these things are directly linked to VOC exposure in the drinking water."

Ensminger said the federal government needs to notify more people of what happened, a feeling shared by retired Marine Thomas Townsend. Townsend, who now lives in Idaho, said he lost a wife and son to the contaminated drinking water and sent in testimony as part of the hearing.

Townsend said he wants the Marine Corps to notify everyone who lived on base between 1957 and 1987.

"Tell them what happened, and tell them where they can go to find out what's going on," he said.

Maj. Gen. Robert Dickerson, commander of Marine Corps Installations East, also is slated to testify. The hearing starts at 10 a.m. and can be heard online at energycommerce.house.gov.

[thedrifter]

N.C. Marine camp's water under scrutiny

By RITA BEAMISH, Associated Press Writer
2 hours, 16 minutes ago

Thousands of Marines and their families went to serve their country at North Carolina's Camp Lejeune.

Instead, many wound up fighting it, blaming the government for failing to protect them from an enemy that invaded their lives in a most intimate way: through the water that quenched their thirst, cooked their food and filled their bathtubs every day.

The gruff ex-drill instructor is angry leukemia claimed his daughter, Janey. Parents were guilt-ridden that perhaps their own actions had ruined their daughters' health. An aging major still mourns the wife who shared his torment over their baby's fatal birth defects. A former Navy doctor's career was demolished by his rare cancer.

Each used the water that poured from kitchen faucets and bathroom showers at Camp Lejeune, an environmental tragedy realized a generation ago that is drawing new scrutiny from members of Congress outraged over the government's treatment of sick veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and elsewhere.

U.S. health officials here in Atlanta hope to finish a long-awaited study by year's end to examine whether the water tainted with solvents affected the health of children. It will influence the Pentagon's response to at least 850 pending legal claims by people who lived at the Marine base, officials said. The former residents, who together seek nearly $4 billion, believe their families were afflicted by water containing industrial solvents before the Marines shut off the bad wells in the mid-1980s.

At least 120,000 people lived in family housing that may have been affected over three decades, plus uncounted civilian workers and Marines in barracks, Marine Corps figures indicate. Defense officials recently told U.S. health investigators that between 1975 and 1985 alone, nearly 200,000 Marines were stationed at Camp Lejeune.

About 56,000 Marines, family members and civilians now live or work at Camp Lejeune, the sprawling training and deployment base on the Atlantic seaboard. Its water meets current federal standards.

Health officials and lawmakers complain that the Defense Department has delayed disclosure of important documents during investigations into the health impact of water contaminated by a dry cleaner adjacent to Camp Lejeune and by the base's past industrial activities.

"We wouldn't be investigating this disgraceful situation if (the Department of Defense) had put half as much effort into cleaning up the water as it has into stonewalling those who drank it," said Rep. John Dingell (news, bio, voting record), D-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. A subcommittee expects to conduct an oversight hearing Tuesday, the first in a broader review by Democrats investigating the Pentagon's environmental record.

The scrutiny comes as federal regulators consider whether to tighten restrictions on solvents known as TCE, trichloroethylene, and PCE, tetrachloroethylene, common contaminants at military and private industrial sites. The chemicals were highlighted in a 1998 movie starring John Travolta, "A Civil Action," about a lawsuit against corporate polluters in Woburn, Mass.

Marine Corps officials said Camp Lejeune followed environmental rules in effect at the time.

"The health and safety of our Marines and their dependents is of primary concern to the Marine Corps," the service said in a statement. "Base officials provided drinking water consistent with industry practices at the time."

Rep. Barton Stupak, D-Mich., who will preside over the upcoming congressional hearings, complained that the Defense Department considers environmental cleanups to be a low priority. "That has to change," he said.

Government health experts now believe the truth at Camp Lejeune is worse than anyone knew: Its water was contaminated as far back as 1957, and until 1987.

The newly recognized endpoint — nearly two years after the Marines said they closed all the tainted wells — is identified in a new federal water study scheduled for release this month. It is part of the continuing government study by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry into whether Camp Lejeune's water led to leukemia and birth defects in children.

Camp Lejeune's population is believed the largest ever exposed to the solvents at such high levels. The Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing cleanups at more than 150 military installations polluted by the same chemicals. Drinking water usually was unaffected, but underground contamination migrated to surrounding neighborhoods and wells at some sites.

From Cape Cod to the Hawaiian islands, the Defense Department has been forced to provide bottled water, treat ground water and well water and switch residents to municipal water systems. But those incidents have rarely led to litigation or claims like those against Camp Lejeune.

_At the former McClellan Air Force Base in northern California, pollution forced officials to close neighborhood wells, including one that served 23,000 people, after TCE and PCE were found migrating from the base in 1979. Residents now are connected to municipal water systems.

_On Cape Cod, the Massachusetts Military Reservation polluted the main water source for thousands of local residents with hazardous solvents, rocket fuel and other toxins over many years. Officials closed numerous wells and connected residents to municipal water. The Air Force built water treatment systems and the cleanup continues.

At Camp Lejeune, the Marine Corps said in a written statement it gave U.S. health investigators "full access" to its records, including "vast and varied" documents, e-mails, maps, contracts and technical information. However, military lawyers acknowledged they are blocking plans for health officials to disclose some records publicly, citing privacy, legal and security concerns.

"We have always sought to provide a timely response to (health investigators') requests for documents within our control," the Marine Corps said.

Health officials repeatedly have complained about slow Defense responses to their information requests, correspondence shows. Military officials initially opposed a full study of child illnesses and balked for three years at paying for it, according to documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

A criminal investigation by the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department in 2005 at Camp Lejeune noted that federal rules limiting TCE and PCE in drinking water were not in effect until 1989 and 1992 — years after the exposure. The probe found no legal violation or conspiracy to conceal information.

Families are convinced drinking and bathing in the water made them sick, although proof is elusive. They are angry the wells ran for four years after the first sign of contamination in 1980 and 1981, and that the government hasn't notified others who were likely exposed at Camp Lejeune.

Among revelations drawing new scrutiny from Washington: On four occasions to ease a temporary water shortage in 1985 the Marines quietly reopened one well at night even after they had shut it down because of contamination.

Two former Marines, retired Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger and retired Maj. Tom Townsend, have directed their grief into an encyclopedic collection of historical documents, hydrology data, e-mails and other military files they obtained mostly under the Freedom of Information Act. Townsend's stack of papers reaches 20 feet.

Townsend's infant son, Christopher, suffered a fatal heart malformation and other birth defects. By the time his wife of 52 years died of liver cirrhosis last year, Townsend was sure the water was to blame.

Ensminger's wife was pregnant at Camp Lejeune in the 1970s. Their daughter, Janey, died in 1985 at age 9. He described taking dark-haired Janey to the hospital instead of her third-grade classroom, weeping as he watched her slip away. She told him to stop, that she loved him. She lapsed into a coma. She died that day.

"My question is how many more of these scenarios played out in private hospital rooms or in private rooms of people's homes?" Ensminger asked.

PCE and TCE are believed to be carcinogens. TCE is a degreaser and PCE is used in dry cleaning. Studies link them to cancers and to kidney, liver and immune disorders, as well as childhood leukemia and neural tube defects.

Two earlier government health reports on Camp Lejeune underestimated how many base houses the contamination may have reached, documents show. The Marines failed to correct the error even when they reviewed the reports before publication. Townsend spotted the mistake and notified them in 2000, the Marine Corps acknowledged.

The Marines updated their Web site but never told federal health investigators, despite repeated urging by a Marine headquarters environmental official.

"It is important to set the record straight," Kelly Dreyer, the official, wrote in an e-mail to the base in 2000. Eventually, in 2003, Townsend and Ensminger notified the health agency, which is now revising one flawed study.

At a health meeting weeks ago in Atlanta, a former Marine air traffic controller, Jeff Byron, accused the military's bureaucracy of hindering progress on health studies.

Byron and his wife, Mary, wondered whether they might have prevented their two daughters' litany of health problems, including an oral cleft birth defect, spinal disorder and a rare condition called aplastic anemia. Then they became convinced the water was at fault.

"When we moved into base housing, we thought we were moving into a safe environment," Byron said.

Former Navy Dr. Mike Gros of Houston also is upset at the pace of the health investigations, which so far have focused on health risks to fetuses.

Gros lived with his family in a tidy two-story house near the Camp Lejeune hospital where he cared for women and babies in the early 1980s. Later, as a civilian physician, he was stunned to learn he suffers from a rare T-cell lymphoma, which his physician blames on exposure to TCE.

Gros's weak immune system now keeps him home. His life revolves around his massive drug regimen. A federal appeals court recently rejected his bid to sue the government for contaminating him.

"They drag it out and by the time you get them all done, everybody would be dead anyway," he said. "That's the whole purpose of their delaying tactics and it's succeeding."

___

On the Web:

www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/l...index.html

www.usmc.mil/campLejeune/...eyinfo.nsf

www.watersurvivors.com

www.tftptf.com

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Dates important in water contamination

By The Associated Press
Mon Jun 11, 12:02 PM ET

Key events in the contamination of drinking water at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.

_October 1980: Tests through March 1981 show water at the Hadnot Point treatment plant is "highly contaminated" with chlorinated hydrocarbons. A lab chemist urges further analysis. Officials do not test individual wells to find the contamination source.

_May and July 1982: Tests identify TCE and PCE as contaminants in water systems for Hadnot Point and Tarawa Terrace, which over the years served housing, schools, other buildings and swimming pools at Camp Lejeune.

_July 1984: The base begins testing individual wells and by February 1985 shuts down 10 showing high levels of solvents. In at least one case, a well shows TCE levels at 18,900 parts per billion. The U.S. government eventually specifies water is unsafe with TCE levels higher than 5 parts per billion at the tap.

_January 1985: A fuel spill closes a clean water system. Homes and a school are connected on an emergency basis to the Hadnot Point system for 12 days. They receive contaminated water.

_March through April 1985: A well that had been shut down for contamination is turned on to pump water to residents of Tarawa Terrace on four nights to ease a temporary water shortage.

_April 1985: The base commander, Maj. Gen. L.H. Buehl, urges families in Tarawa Terrace to conserve water and tells them wells were closed as a precaution over "minute" amounts of organic chemicals. He does not mention that contamination levels exceeded maximum recommended exposure limits several times over.

_March 1987: The water treatment system for Tarawa Terrace is shut down and homes are connected to a new water treatment plant.

_October 1989: Camp Lejeune is added to the Superfund list of the nation's highly contaminated hazardous waste sites.

_August 1997: A federal health agency, the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, recommends a study of babies born to women who were exposed to Camp Lejeune's water while pregnant.

_August 1998: The federal health study shows a link between solvent-contaminated water and low birth-weight babies born to some women at Camp Lejeune. The study undercounts mothers who may have been exposed because it assumes a clean treatment plant provided them water for four years before it was constructed.

_1999: The federal health agency begins searching for leukemia cases and birth defects among babies who were in utero at the base from 1968, when birth records first were computerized, until 1985, when all contaminated wells were believed to have been shut down.

_2003: The health agency begins to study whether Camp Lejeune's contaminated water is linked to birth defects and an elevated incidence of leukemia in its survey of 12,600 children.

_October 2004: An outside panel convened by the Marines determines that Camp Lejeune did not understand the significance of its water contamination early on and that Navy environmental advisors were "not aggressive" in assisting them. However, the panel concludes that Marine leadership acted responsibly and provided water quality consistent with general practices at the time.

_April 2005: Criminal investigators from the Environmental Protection Agency find no illegal actions or cover up in Camp Lejeune's handling of its water contamination. The Justice Department declines to prosecute.

___

Sources: Marine Corps chronology, Environmental Protection Agency, Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, Marine Corps documents.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Posted on Tue, Jun. 12, 2007
Ex-Marines feeling betrayed
Panel studies disease links to Camp Lejeune water
By Rita Beamish
Associated Press

ATLANTA – Thousands of Marines and their families went to serve their country at North Carolina’s Camp Lejeune.

Instead, many wound up fighting it, blaming the government for failing to protect them from an enemy that invaded their lives in a most intimate way: through the water that quenched their thirst, cooked their food and filled their bathtubs every day.

The gruff ex-drill instructor is angry leukemia claimed his daughter, Janey. Parents were guilt-ridden that perhaps their own actions had ruined their daughters’ health. An aging major still mourns the wife who shared his torment over their baby’s fatal birth defects. A former Navy doctor’s career was demolished by his rare cancer.

Each used the water that poured from kitchen faucets and bathroom showers at Camp Lejeune, an environmental tragedy realized a generation ago that is drawing new scrutiny from members of Congress outraged over the government’s treatment of sick veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and elsewhere.

U.S. health officials in Atlanta hope to finish a long-awaited study by year’s end to examine whether the water tainted with solvents affected the health of children. It will influence the Pentagon’s response to at least 850 pending legal claims by people who lived at the Marine base, officials said. The former residents, who together seek nearly $4 billion, believe their families were afflicted by water containing industrial solvents before the Marines shut off the bad wells in the mid-1980s.

At least 120,000 people lived in family housing that may have been affected over three decades, plus uncounted civilian workers and Marines in barracks, Marine Corps figures indicate. Defense officials recently told U.S. health investigators that between 1975 and 1985 alone, nearly 200,000 Marines were stationed at Camp Lejeune.

About 56,000 Marines, family members and civilians now live or work at Camp Lejeune, the sprawling training and deployment base on the Atlantic seaboard. Its water meets current federal standards.

Health officials and lawmakers complain that the Defense Department has delayed disclosure of important documents during investigations into the health implications of water contaminated by a dry cleaner adjacent to Camp Lejeune and by the base’s past industrial activities.

“We wouldn’t be investigating this disgraceful situation if (the Department of Defense) had put half as much effort into cleaning up the water as it has into stonewalling those who drank it,” said Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. A subcommittee expects to conduct an oversight hearing today, the first in a broader review by Democrats investigating the Pentagon’s environmental record.

The scrutiny comes as federal regulators consider whether to tighten restrictions on solvents known as TCE, trichloroethylene, and PCE, tetrachloroethylene, common contaminants at military and private industrial sites.

Marine Corps officials said Camp Lejeune followed environmental rules in effect at the time.

“The health and safety of our Marines and their dependents is of primary concern to the Marine Corps,” the service said in a statement. “Base officials provided drinking water consistent with industry practices at the time.”

Rep. Barton Stupak, D-Mich., who will preside over the upcoming congressional hearings, complained that the Defense Department considers environmental cleanups to be a low priority. “That has to change,” he said.

Government health experts now believe the truth at Camp Lejeune is worse than anyone knew: Its water was contaminated as far back as 1957, and until 1987.

The newly recognized endpoint – nearly two years after the Marines said they closed all the tainted wells – is identified in a new federal water study scheduled for release this month. It is part of the continuing government study by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry into whether Camp Lejeune’s water led to leukemia and birth defects in children.

Camp Lejeune’s population is believed the largest ever exposed to the solvents at such high levels. The Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing cleanups at more than 150 military installations polluted by the same chemicals.

From Cape Cod to the Hawaiian islands, the Defense Department has been forced to provide bottled water, treat groundwater and well water and switch residents to municipal water systems. But those incidents have rarely led to litigation or claims like those against Camp Lejeune.

A criminal investigation by the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department in 2005 at Camp Lejeune noted that federal rules limiting TCE and PCE in drinking water were not in effect until 1989 and 1992 – years after the exposure. The probe found no legal violation or conspiracy to conceal information.

Families are convinced drinking and bathing in the water made them sick, although proof is elusive. They are angry the wells ran for four years after the first sign of contamination in 1980 and 1981, and that the government hasn’t notified others who were likely exposed at Camp Lejeune.

Among revelations drawing new scrutiny from Washington: On four occasions to ease a temporary water shortage in 1985 the Marines quietly reopened one well at night even after they had shut it down because of contamination.

Two former Marines, retired Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger and retired Maj. Tom Townsend, have directed their grief into an encyclopedic collection of historical documents, hydrology data, e-mails and other military files they obtained mostly under the Freedom of Information Act. Townsend’s stack of papers reaches 20 feet.

Townsend’s infant son, Christopher, suffered a fatal heart malformation and other birth defects. By the time his wife of 52 years died of liver cirrhosis last year, Townsend was sure the water was to blame.

Ensminger’s wife was pregnant at Camp Lejeune in the 1970s. Their daughter, Janey, died in 1985 at age 9. He described taking dark-haired Janey to the hospital instead of her third-grade classroom, weeping as he watched her slip away. She told him to stop, that she loved him. She lapsed into a coma. She died that day.

“My question is how many more of these scenarios played out in private hospital rooms or in private rooms of people’s homes?” Ensminger asked.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Published - June, 12, 2007
Marines in a fight for their lives
Tainted water at Camp Lejeune has affected thousands
Rita Beamish
Associated Press
ATLANTA -- Thousands of Marines and their families went to serve their country at North Carolina's Camp Lejeune.

Instead, many wound up fighting it, blaming the government for failing to protect them from an enemy that invaded their lives in a most intimate way: through the water that quenched their thirst, cooked their food and filled their bathtubs every day.

The gruff ex-drill instructor is angry leukemia claimed his daughter, Janey. Parents were guilt-ridden that perhaps their own actions had ruined their daughters' health. An aging major still mourns the wife who shared his torment over their baby's fatal birth defects. A former Navy doctor's career was demolished by his rare cancer.

Each used the water that poured from kitchen faucets and bathroom showers at Camp Lejeune, an environmental tragedy realized a generation ago that is drawing new scrutiny from members of Congress outraged over the government's treatment of sick veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and elsewhere.

U.S. health officials in Atlanta hope to finish a long-awaited study by year's end to examine whether the water tainted with solvents affected the health of children. It will influence the Pentagon's response to at least 850 pending legal claims by people who lived at the Marine base, officials said. The former residents, who together seek nearly $4 billion, believe their families were afflicted by water containing industrial solvents before the Marines shut off the bad wells in the mid-1980s.

At least 120,000 people lived in family housing that may have been affected over three decades, plus uncounted civilian workers and Marines in barracks, Marine Corps figures indicate. Defense officials recently told U.S. health investigators that between 1975 and 1985 alone, nearly 200,000 Marines were stationed at Camp Lejeune.

About 56,000 Marines, family members and civilians now live or work at Camp Lejeune, the sprawling training and deployment base on the Atlantic seaboard. Its water meets current federal standards.

Health officials and lawmakers complain that the Defense Department has delayed disclosure of important documents during investigations into the health impact of water contaminated by a dry cleaner adjacent to Camp Lejeune and by the base's past industrial activities.

"We wouldn't be investigating this disgraceful situation if (the Department of Defense) had put half as much effort into cleaning up the water as it has into stonewalling those who drank it," said Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. A subcommittee expects to conduct an oversight hearing today, the first in a broader review by Democrats investigating the Pentagon's environmental record.

The scrutiny comes as federal regulators consider whether to tighten restrictions on solvents known as TCE, trichloroethylene, and PCE, tetrachloroethylene, common contaminants at military and private industrial sites. The chemicals were highlighted in a 1998 movie starring John Travolta, "A Civil Action," about a lawsuit against corporate polluters in Woburn, Mass.

Marine Corps officials said Camp Lejeune followed environmental rules in effect at the time.

"The health and safety of our Marines and their dependents is of primary concern to the Marine Corps," the service said in a statement. "Base officials provided drinking water consistent with industry practices at the time."

Rep. Barton Stupak, D-Mich., who will preside over the upcoming congressional hearings, complained that the Defense Department considers environmental cleanups to be a low priority. "That has to change," he said.

Government health experts now believe the truth at Camp Lejeune is worse than anyone knew: Its water was contaminated as far back as 1957, and until 1987.

The newly recognized endpoint -- nearly two years after the Marines said they closed all the tainted wells -- is identified in a new federal water study scheduled for release this month. It is part of the continuing government study by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry into whether Camp Lejeune's water led to leukemia and birth defects in children.

Camp Lejeune's population is believed the largest ever exposed to the solvents at such high levels. The Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing cleanups at more than 150 military installations polluted by the same chemicals. Drinking water usually was unaffected, but underground contamination migrated to surrounding neighborhoods and wells at some sites.

From Cape Cod to the Hawaiian islands, the Defense Department has been forced to provide bottled water, treat ground water and well water and switch residents to municipal water systems. But those incidents have rarely led to litigation or claims like those against Camp Lejeune.

· At the former McClellan Air Force Base in northern California, pollution forced officials to close neighborhood wells, including one that served 23,000 people, after TCE and PCE were found migrating from the base in 1979. Residents now are connected to municipal water systems.

· On Cape Cod, the Massachusetts Military Reservation polluted the main water source for thousands of local residents with hazardous solvents, rocket fuel and other toxins over many years. Officials closed numerous wells and connected residents to municipal water. The Air Force built water treatment systems and the cleanup continues.

A lack of full disclosure

At Camp Lejeune, the Marine Corps said in a written statement it gave U.S. health investigators "full access" to its records, including "vast and varied" documents, e-mails, maps, contracts and technical information. However, military lawyers acknowledged they are blocking plans for health officials to disclose some records publicly, citing privacy, legal and security concerns.

"We have always sought to provide a timely response to (health investigators') requests for documents within our control," the Marine Corps said.

Health officials repeatedly have complained about slow Defense responses to their information requests, correspondence shows. Military officials initially opposed a full study of child illnesses and balked for three years at paying for it, according to documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

A criminal investigation by the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department in 2005 at Camp Lejeune noted that federal rules limiting TCE and PCE in drinking water were not in effect until 1989 and 1992 -- years after the exposure. The probe found no legal violation or conspiracy to conceal information.

Families are convinced drinking and bathing in the water made them sick, although proof is elusive. They are angry the wells ran for four years after the first sign of contamination in 1980 and 1981, and that the government hasn't notified others who were likely exposed at Camp Lejeune.

Among revelations drawing new scrutiny from Washington: On four occasions to ease a temporary water shortage in 1985 the Marines quietly reopened one well at night even after they had shut it down because of contamination.

Birth defects emerge

Two former Marines, retired Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger and retired Maj. Tom Townsend, have directed their grief into an encyclopedic collection of historical documents, hydrology data, e-mails and other military files they obtained mostly under the Freedom of Information Act. Townsend's stack of papers reaches 20 feet.

Townsend's infant son, Christopher, suffered a fatal heart malformation and other birth defects. By the time his wife of 52 years died of liver cirrhosis last year, Townsend was sure the water was to blame.

Ensminger's wife was pregnant at Camp Lejeune in the 1970s. Their daughter, Janey, died in 1985 at age 9. He described taking dark-haired Janey to the hospital instead of her third-grade classroom, weeping as he watched her slip away. She told him to stop, that she loved him. She lapsed into a coma. She died that day.

"My question is how many more of these scenarios played out in private hospital rooms or in private rooms of people's homes?" Ensminger asked.

PCE and TCE are believed to be carcinogens. TCE is a degreaser and PCE is used in dry cleaning. Studies link them to cancers and to kidney, liver and immune disorders, as well as childhood leukemia and neural tube defects.

Two earlier government health reports on Camp Lejeune underestimated how many base houses the contamination may have reached, documents show. The Marines failed to correct the error even when they reviewed the reports before publication. Townsend spotted the mistake and notified them in 2000, the Marine Corps acknowledged.

The Marines updated their Web site but never told federal health investigators, despite repeated urging by a Marine headquarters environmental official.

"It is important to set the record straight," Kelly Dreyer, the official, wrote in an e-mail to the base in 2000. Eventually, in 2003, Townsend and Ensminger notified the health agency, which is now revising one flawed study.

Fighting red tape

At a health meeting weeks ago in Atlanta, a former Marine air traffic controller, Jeff Byron, accused the military's bureaucracy of hindering progress on health studies.

Byron and his wife, Mary, wondered whether they might have prevented their two daughters' litany of health problems, including an oral cleft birth defect, spinal disorder and a rare condition called aplastic anemia. Then they became convinced the water was at fault.

"When we moved into base housing, we thought we were moving into a safe environment," Byron said.

Former Navy Dr. Mike Gros of Houston also is upset at the pace of the health investigations, which so far have focused on health risks to fetuses.

Gros lived with his family in a tidy two-story house near the Camp Lejeune hospital where he cared for women and babies in the early 1980s. Later, as a civilian physician, he was stunned to learn he suffers from a rare T-cell lymphoma, which his physician blames on exposure to TCE.

Gros's weak immune system now keeps him home. His life revolves around his massive drug regimen. A federal appeals court recently rejected his bid to sue the government for contaminating him.

"They drag it out and by the time you get them all done, everybody would be dead anyway," he said. "That's the whole purpose of their delaying tactics and it's succeeding."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Solvents in water present perils

By RITA BEAMISH, Associated Press Writer
Mon Jun 11, 11:58 AM ET

Industrial solvents known as TCE and PCE are known health hazards, but the amount of exposure that can cause harm is subject to debate.

Both are found at toxic cleanup sites. They leach into ground water and soil and can release vapors that are harmful if inhaled.

The Environmental Protection Agency describes the substances as probable carcinogens and may further reduce the amounts permitted in drinking water to less than 5 parts per billion.

Last year, the National Research Council said evidence is growing that TCE causes cancer and other illness, such as reproductive and developmental problems, impaired neurological function and autoimmune disease. The panel urged environmental regulators to act soon on a new standard. But the EPA has yet to do so.

TCE, or trichloroethylene, is used for degreasing metals. PCE, or tetrachloroethylene, is a dry-cleaning agent.

Studies link them to several cancers, developmental toxicity, endocrine effects and reproductive problems, as well as leukemia and heart, neural tube and oral cleft defects in babies.

Contamination of drinking wells years ago at North Carolina's Marine Base Camp Lejeune still reverberates in health concerns.

An environmental health professor at Boston University, Dr. Richard Clapp, said there is a strong case for linking illnesses to exposure among the Marines and their families. Clapp is a scientific expert on an advisory panel organized by federal health investigators examining the contamination there.

"The Camp Lejeune exposures were quite high, probably some the highest drinking water exposures ever seen in this country," Clapp said.

Clapp testified in 2004 for IBM employees who accused the company of exposing them to TCE and other workplace toxins.

A former Marine, Denita McCall, believes her parathyroid cancer was caused by her time at Camp Lejeune in the early 1980s. She underwent successful surgery. But at 43 with three children, she lives in fear of recurrence.

"It's a big thing to wrap your mind around," she said. "You drink water, you get sick, you die. You can't fathom that."

Cindy Cribb was stunned when three of her four children, who attended school and swam in pools at Camp Lejeune, were stricken in their 20s with illnesses never experienced in the family: non-Hodgkins lymphoma and testicular cancer, kidney cancer and unexplained internal pain and kidney problems.

"They have lost so much in life," she said. "I felt guilty for living there."

The director of Houston's Medical Center for Immune and Toxic Disorders, Dr. Andrew Campbell, said he has treated several former Camp Lejeune residents who share symptoms although they now live across the country: immune, neurological and reproductive problems, and children with unusual behavioral and processing problems.

Campbell says TCE-laced water caused a rare T-Cell lymphoma in his patient, former Navy Dr. Mike Gros. Gros, who lived and worked at the base in the 1980s, won full disability status from the Veterans Administration.

Government researchers found leukemia at twice the expected level in children whose mothers lived at the base while pregnant between 1968 and 1985, and they are investigating whether the solvents are implicated.

"At what levels they are dangerous is where a lot of the dispute lies," said Frank Bove, senior epidemiologist with the U.S. Agency for Toxic substances and Disease Registry. Research so far has focused on animals or people who inhaled the chemicals at work, not drinking water exposure.

An industry lobby, the Halogenated Solvents Industry Alliance, has questioned whether the levels of contamination and conditions at Camp Lejeune could have resulted in the illnesses blamed on the chemicals.

The group believes that the EPA's current drinking water standard sufficiently protects human health, and that strengthening it would have no measurable effect on cancer incidence, said Steve Risotto, the group's executive director.

___

On the Web:

www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/l...e_pce.html

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marines drank tainted water for 30 years: CDC

Tue Jun 12, 3:51 PM ET

As many as 75,000 people may have drunk water contaminated by dry cleaning fluid at the Marine base at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Tuesday.

The contamination lasted for 30 years until the affected wells were closed, and Marines and their families drank the affected water during their average two-year assignments at the base, the CDC said.

The water was polluted with tetrachloroethylene, also known as PCE, a dry cleaning solvent that has been linked with cancer, the CDC said.

"The Department of Health and Human Services has determined that PCE may be a carcinogen," the CDC said in a statement.

"But the effects of consumers' exposure to drinking water contaminated with PCE are not known. Some health studies have found adverse effects in occupational settings. However, exposure to PCE alone typically does not mean a person will experience adverse health effects," the CDC said.

The affected area is the Tarawa Terrace family housing area, and the contamination lasted from November 1957 through February 1987, the agency said. An off-base dry cleaners leaked the fluid into a septic system near the housing area's well.

"The maximum concentration of PCE in Tarawa Terrace drinking water was estimated to be about 200 micrograms per liter. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's EPA maximum contaminant level (was) 5 micrograms per liter during the period," the CDC said.

High levels of lead were found in tap water at Camp Lejeune in 1994, and pesticides were found in the soil. Other potentially harmful chemicals have been found in the water of other housing areas on the camp, as well, according to previous reports published by the CDC.

Government toxicology experts have been studying the health of babies born there from 1968 to 1985.

PCE is a volatile organic compound. Some compounds in this class have been linked with birth defects such as cleft palate or spina bifida, and childhood cancers. The CDC encouraged anyone who may have been affected to get regular health checks.

Last year, a team at Columbia University in New York found some evidence to suggest that PCE may be linked with schizophrenia.

[thedrifter]

Marine Families Want $4B For Decades of Toxic Tap Water

Tuesday , June 12, 2007

ATLANTA —
Thousands of Marines and their families went to serve their country at North Carolina's Camp Lejeune.

Instead, many wound up fighting it, blaming the government for failing to protect them from an enemy that invaded their lives in a most intimate way: through the water that quenched their thirst, cooked their food and filled their bathtubs every day.

The gruff ex-drill instructor is angry leukemia claimed his daughter, Janey. Parents were guilt-ridden that perhaps their own actions had ruined their daughters' health. An aging major still mourns the wife who shared his torment over their baby's fatal birth defects. A former Navy doctor's career was demolished by his rare cancer.

Each used the water that poured from kitchen faucets and bathroom showers at Camp Lejeune, an environmental tragedy realized a generation ago that is drawing new scrutiny from members of Congress outraged over the government's treatment of sick veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and elsewhere.

U.S. health officials here in Atlanta hope to finish a long-awaited study by year's end to examine whether the water tainted with solvents affected the health of children. It will influence the Pentagon's response to at least 850 pending legal claims by people who lived at the Marine base, officials said. The former residents, who together seek nearly $4 billion, believe their families were afflicted by water containing industrial solvents before the Marines shut off the bad wells in the mid-1980s.

At least 120,000 people lived in family housing that may have been affected over three decades, plus uncounted civilian workers and Marines in barracks, Marine Corps figures indicate. Defense officials recently told U.S. health investigators that between 1975 and 1985 alone, nearly 200,000 Marines were stationed at Camp Lejeune.

About 56,000 Marines, family members and civilians now live or work at Camp Lejeune, the sprawling training and deployment base on the Atlantic seaboard. Its water meets current federal standards.

Health officials and lawmakers complain that the Defense Department has delayed disclosure of important documents during investigations into the health impact of water contaminated by a dry cleaner adjacent to Camp Lejeune and by the base's past industrial activities.

"We wouldn't be investigating this disgraceful situation if (the Department of Defense) had put half as much effort into cleaning up the water as it has into stonewalling those who drank it," said Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. A subcommittee expects to conduct an oversight hearing Tuesday, the first in a broader review by Democrats investigating the Pentagon's environmental record.

The scrutiny comes as federal regulators consider whether to tighten restrictions on solvents known as TCE, trichloroethylene, and PCE, tetrachloroethylene, common contaminants at military and private industrial sites. The chemicals were highlighted in a 1998 movie starring John Travolta, "A Civil Action," about a lawsuit against corporate polluters in Woburn, Mass.

Marine Corps officials said Camp Lejeune followed environmental rules in effect at the time.

"The health and safety of our Marines and their dependents is of primary concern to the Marine Corps," the service said in a statement. "Base officials provided drinking water consistent with industry practices at the time."

Rep. Barton Stupak, D-Mich., who will preside over the upcoming congressional hearings, complained that the Defense Department considers environmental cleanups to be a low priority. "That has to change," he said.

Government health experts now believe the truth at Camp Lejeune is worse than anyone knew: Its water was contaminated as far back as 1957, and until 1987.

The newly recognized endpoint — nearly two years after the Marines said they closed all the tainted wells — is identified in a new federal water study scheduled for release this month. It is part of the continuing government study by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry into whether Camp Lejeune's water led to leukemia and birth defects in children.

Camp Lejeune's population is believed the largest ever exposed to the solvents at such high levels. The Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing cleanups at more than 150 military installations polluted by the same chemicals. Drinking water usually was unaffected, but underground contamination migrated to surrounding neighborhoods and wells at some sites.

From Cape Cod to the Hawaiian islands, the Defense Department has been forced to provide bottled water, treat ground water and well water and switch residents to municipal water systems. But those incidents have rarely led to litigation or claims like those against Camp Lejeune.

—At the former McClellan Air Force Base in northern California, pollution forced officials to close neighborhood wells, including one that served 23,000 people, after TCE and PCE were found migrating from the base in 1979. Residents now are connected to municipal water systems.

—On Cape Cod, the Massachusetts Military Reservation polluted the main water source for thousands of local residents with hazardous solvents, rocket fuel and other toxins over many years. Officials closed numerous wells and connected residents to municipal water. The Air Force built water treatment systems and the cleanup continues.

At Camp Lejeune, the Marine Corps said in a written statement it gave U.S. health investigators "full access" to its records, including "vast and varied" documents, e-mails, maps, contracts and technical information. However, military lawyers acknowledged they are blocking plans for health officials to disclose some records publicly, citing privacy, legal and security concerns.

"We have always sought to provide a timely response to (health investigators') requests for documents within our control," the Marine Corps said.

Health officials repeatedly have complained about slow Defense responses to their information requests, correspondence shows. Military officials initially opposed a full study of child illnesses and balked for three years at paying for it, according to documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

A criminal investigation by the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department in 2005 at Camp Lejeune noted that federal rules limiting TCE and PCE in drinking water were not in effect until 1989 and 1992 — years after the exposure. The probe found no legal violation or conspiracy to conceal information.

Families are convinced drinking and bathing in the water made them sick, although proof is elusive. They are angry the wells ran for four years after the first sign of contamination in 1980 and 1981, and that the government hasn't notified others who were likely exposed at Camp Lejeune.

Among revelations drawing new scrutiny from Washington: On four occasions to ease a temporary water shortage in 1985 the Marines quietly reopened one well at night even after they had shut it down because of contamination.

Two former Marines, retired Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger and retired Maj. Tom Townsend, have directed their grief into an encyclopedic collection of historical documents, hydrology data, e-mails and other military files they obtained mostly under the Freedom of Information Act. Townsend's stack of papers reaches 20 feet.

Townsend's infant son, Christopher, suffered a fatal heart malformation and other birth defects. By the time his wife of 52 years died of liver cirrhosis last year, Townsend was sure the water was to blame.

Ensminger's wife was pregnant at Camp Lejeune in the 1970s. Their daughter, Janey, died in 1985 at age 9. He described taking dark-haired Janey to the hospital instead of her third-grade classroom, weeping as he watched her slip away. She told him to stop, that she loved him. She lapsed into a coma. She died that day.

"My question is how many more of these scenarios played out in private hospital rooms or in private rooms of people's homes?" Ensminger asked.

PCE and TCE are believed to be carcinogens. TCE is a degreaser and PCE is used in dry cleaning. Studies link them to cancers and to kidney, liver and immune disorders, as well as childhood leukemia and neural tube defects.

Two earlier government health reports on Camp Lejeune underestimated how many base houses the contamination may have reached, documents show. The Marines failed to correct the error even when they reviewed the reports before publication. Townsend spotted the mistake and notified them in 2000, the Marine Corps acknowledged.

The Marines updated their Web site but never told federal health investigators, despite repeated urging by a Marine headquarters environmental official.

"It is important to set the record straight," Kelly Dreyer, the official, wrote in an e-mail to the base in 2000. Eventually, in 2003, Townsend and Ensminger notified the health agency, which is now revising one flawed study.

At a health meeting weeks ago in Atlanta, a former Marine air traffic controller, Jeff Byron, accused the military's bureaucracy of hindering progress on health studies.

Byron and his wife, Mary, wondered whether they might have prevented their two daughters' litany of health problems, including an oral cleft birth defect, spinal disorder and a rare condition called aplastic anemia. Then they became convinced the water was at fault.

"When we moved into base housing, we thought we were moving into a safe environment," Byron said.

Former Navy Dr. Mike Gros of Houston also is upset at the pace of the health investigations, which so far have focused on health risks to fetuses.

Gros lived with his family in a tidy two-story house near the Camp Lejeune hospital where he cared for women and babies in the early 1980s. Later, as a civilian physician, he was stunned to learn he suffers from a rare T-cell lymphoma, which his physician blames on exposure to TCE.

Gros's weak immune system now keeps him home. His life revolves around his massive drug regimen. A federal appeals court recently rejected his bid to sue the government for contaminating him.

"They drag it out and by the time you get them all done, everybody would be dead anyway," he said. "That's the whole purpose of their delaying tactics and it's succeeding."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marines ingested high levels of toxins
New analysis shows large amounts of solvents contaminated drinking water at North Carolina base from 1957 to 1987
By Kimberly Hefling

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Contra Costa Times
Article Launched:06/13/2007 03:03:40 AM PDT

WASHINGTON -- Marine families who lived at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina during three decades drank water contaminated with toxins as much as 40 times more than today's safety standard, federal health investigators said Tuesday.

The government disclosed results from a new scientific study on the same day families testified for Congress about cancers and other illnesses they blame on tainted tap water at the sprawling training and deployment base.

The House Energy and Commerce panel, which held the hearing, described the sickened Marines as "poisoned patriots."

At least 850 former residents of the base have filed administrative claims, seeking nearly $4 billion, for exposure to the industrial solvents TCE and PCE that contaminated Camp Lejeune's drinking wells before 1987.

"My wife and I now have new full-time careers just staying alive and figuring out how to pay for it all," said former Navy Dr. Michael Gros of Spring, Texas. He was stunned to learn years after his work in the 1980s as an obstetrician and gynecologist at Camp Lejeune that he had a rare non-Hodgkins lymphoma.

Gros told lawmakers Tuesday that he has accumulated medical bills totaling more than $4.5 million and worries regularly about bankruptcy.

The U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry said its new modeling and analysis of Camp Lejeune's Tarawa Terrace drinking water system from 1957 to 1987 found levels of the dry-cleaning solvent PCE, or tetrachloroethylene, as high as 200 parts per billion, compared with 5 parts per billion that federal regulators in 1992 set as the maximum allowable level.

The Navy Judge Advocate General's office promised lawmakers that it will "thoroughly analyze each and every claim utilizing the best scientific research available," according to prepared testimony. It is waiting for a government scientific study about how the water affected babies in utero.

Federal health officials have new analyses indicating Camp Lejeune's water was contaminated as far back as 1957 and up to 1987. The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry cites the new endpoint -- nearly two years after Marines said they closed all the tainted wells -- in a continuing study on whether Camp Lejeune's water led to leukemia and birth defects in children. That study is expected to be finished as early as the end of the year.

TCE, or trichloroethylene, is a degreasing solvent, and PCE, or tetrachloroethylene, is a dry-cleaning agent. The government describes both substances as probable carcinogens.

Marine Corps officials said Camp Lejeune provided water consistent with industry practices of the time, and that its Marines' health and safety are of primary concern.

Jerry Ensminger of White Lake, N.C., a Marine for 24 years, lost his 9-year-old daughter to leukemia. In heart-rending testimony, he described comforting her during agonizing cancer treatments. He said that toward the end of her life, she endured taunts from classmates about her appearance after chemotherapy.

"It is time for the United States Marine Corps to live up to their motto 'Semper Fidelis,'" always faithful, Ensminger said.

Marine officials have said they didn't immediately act when they learned of the contaminants because the federal standards were not yet in place.

The health agency estimated 75,000 people lived in the affected base neighborhood during those three decades.

The agency launched a new Web site, www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/lejeune, for people to learn the levels of contamination that came from their faucets at different times.

The newly released study is part of the health agency's ongoing investigation into whether exposure to the solvents caused birth defects and leukemia in babies.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Man Believes Son's Death Linked to Military Water

Submitted by Bethany Mowry on June 13, 2007 - 4:54pm. News

Alvin Shipp believes contaminated water at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina is responsible for the death of his son and as a recent congressional hearing proves, he is not the only one.

Even through his son's treatment for leukemia, retired Marine First Sergeant Alvin Shipp remembers his son as a child filled with laughter.

Alvin Shipp, Retired Marine 1st Sgt.:
"He was still a happy boy."

That happy boy died in 1968. Shipps says his son's disease was caused by a water source now at the heart of a House panel investigation.

Shipp:
"I deeply feel my son contacted leukemia because of that contaminated water at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina."

Like tens of thousands of others, Shipp and his family lived at Camp Lejeune between the 1950's and the 1980's. During that time, the federal government says toxins from a Camp Lejeune dry cleaners contaminated the water source...toxins scientific studies link to leukemia. Shipp's son was conceived on base and lived his short life there.

Shipp:
"He died in '68 and I didn't find out about this until 2002 through a newspaper article."

A CBS report detailed more than 800 residents suffered similar situations. In recent congressional hearings, studies show the amount of toxin in the water was nearly 40 times the current maximum. But those standards were not in place when Shipp and his family lived on base.

Shipp:
"And I feel that the federal government should have inspected that water at least once a year and they never did make corrections."

Now he says he spends his retirement in Rossville fighting to repair the turmoil caused by the loss of his son.

Shipp:
"Shame on the federal government, that's exactly the way I feel about it."

Marine Corps officials testified the water at Camp Lejeune met the standards of the years in question.
Nearly 850 former Camp Lejeune residents have filed claims totaling 4 million dollars -- Alvin Shipp is one of them.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

June 14, 2007 - 12:00AM
Families feeling repercussions

CHRISSY VICK
DAILY NEWS STAFF
More than 20 years have passed since contaminated water wells were shut down aboard Camp Lejeune, but Cindy Cribb says her family is still dealing with the effects.

The Jacksonville native and her husband, a retired Marine, moved into base housing aboard Camp Lejeune in February 1982, just a month after her youngest son was born at the Naval Hospital. The Cribbs and their four children stayed in the same house aboard the base in Watkins Village for the next 18 years.

Cribb watched her children go on to pursue education, family and careers, never realizing three of them would be in for lengthy battles with numerous health problems, including two who now have cancer.

She blames those problems on water contaminated as much as 40 times over today's safety standard at Camp Lejeune. The water was polluted from the mid-1950s until 1987 by the chemicals trichloroethylene (TCE), a degreasing solvent, and tetrachloroethylene (PCE), a dry-cleaning agent.

The chemicals were found in 1980, and polluted wells were shut down in 1985.

The contamination was caused by industrial operations, past waste disposal practices and leaking underground storage tanks, along with solvent-disposal practices at ABC One-Hour Cleaners in Jacksonville, according to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry Web site.

Richlands resident Jerry Ensminger, who testified before Congress at Tuesday's hearing on the issue, said he believes that is what caused his 9-year-old daughter to die of leukemia.

He said Tuesday's hearing went "extremely well."

"I was really pleased with the outcome and the impact it's had," he said. "We've gotten a lot of media coverage, and this is a very serious issue that needs this attention."

No one who lived at Camp Lejeune spanning the three decades has been officially notified of the contamination and its possible effects, he said. He hopes the Marine Corps will do so and also help the families who have been affected.

"I hope to see justice for everybody, not just the babies exposed in utero, but the adults and siblings of those babies," he said.

That is what Cribb hopes for her family and the others affected. They are just a few of as many as a million people exposed to the toxic water, according to results disclosed Tuesday from a new government study.

"I feel angry," Cribb said. "I'm very confident the water did this to my children, because this just does not run in my family or my husband's family. We lived there 18 years in the same house. The kids drank that water, bathed in it, swam in it."

In June 2004, her 22-year-old son Michael was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and found to have a large tumor over his heart. He was treated with chemotherapy and radiation and later received a stem-cell transplant.

And just when they thought they'd been through the worst, Michael was diagnosed last year with testicular cancer and had to undergo an orchiectomy.

Meanwhile, the hospital bills have been mounting by the thousands.

"Just the transplant was $200,000," Cribb said. "I was terrified."

Now, Cribb says she and her husband work constantly to pay the bills, while her son's life is put on hold. One of her daughters, Tiffany, 29, was recently diagnosed with kidney cancer after suffering other problems.

"Her doctor said it is a miracle they found it because it's very unusual that anyone under age 50 has this," Cribb said.

Cribb's oldest daughter, Michelle, also suffers from numerous health problems, and doctors are currently unable to diagnose her. And while she knows nothing can take away the health issues her children now suffer, she hopes to get some assistance.

"I hope that the Marine Corps steps up and helps us all out," she said. "It's just sad when you have all these bills and the hospital doesn't want to treat you because you don't have money."

Ensminger helped set up the Web site www.tftptf.com as a way for people like Cribb to connect and find out more information.

"We are the few, the proud and the forgotten," he said. "The Marine Corps needs to live up to their motto and take care of their own."

For more information on the Camp Lejeune water contamination and the chemicals involved, visit the Web sites www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/Lejeune and www.usmc.mil/camplejeune/clbwatersurveyinfo.nsf.



Contact staff writer Chrissy Vick at cvick@freedomenc.com or by calling 353-1171, ext. 8466.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Do right by the Marines

For 20 years, up to a million Marines and their families drank poisoned water pumped from under Camp Lejeune. For 20 more years, trying to get facts about that mass poisoning has been like trying to coax water from a failing well.

That near-drought might possibly be coming to an end.

A new government report provides new details about the levels of cancer-causing toxins in the water and how many people drank it - some of them, for five years after it was discovered.

A powerful Democratic congressman is vowing to scrutinize the way the Environmental Protection Agency and the Navy investigated the issue in 2005.

The Corps had drilled into it in 2004, concluding that it had lacked the money, people and training to detect the seriousness of the pollution. It also found that a Navy lab had ignored four contaminated water samples.

The best the Marines could say for themselves was that plenty of other water systems around the country had also failed to pay much attention to contamination. Those systems, and Lejeune, presumably changed their ways when the feds tightened health standards.

The EPA was supposed to look into the matter in 2005, but it apparently didn't get very far.

Testifying Tuesday before a House committee - over the objections of the Bush administration - an EPA investigator said that some civilian employees of the Navy appeared to have been coached. He said officials considered charging some employees with obstruction of justice. But they didn't.

Some families who drank the chemical-laced water believe it contributed to serious health problems and deaths. Nobody really knows whether that's true.

Whatever any further investigations might find, one thing is clear: The government owes more than an apology to injured Marines and their families. It owes them money.

That's no substitute for health, but it can help pay for treatment and care. Equally important, it can remind civilian and military officials that there's a high price to be paid for needlessly endangering the health of patriotic Americans and their loved ones.

Ellie