My Congressman's Response

[carlie]

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June 23, 2009

Thank you for letting me know of your support for H.R. 2254, the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009. As a long-time supporter of the millions of men and women who served our nation in uniform, you can be sure that I share your interest in this regard and appreciate knowing of your thoughts.

As you know, H.R. 2254 would clarify laws regarding presumption of exposure to certain herbicides, such as Agent Orange, while serving in Vietnam. This legislation has been referred to the House Veteran's Affairs Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs where it awaits further consideration. Because of your interest in this matter, and in an effort to be of all possible assistance to you, I have taken the liberty of sharing your support for the Agent Orange Equity Act with my colleagues on the subcommittee. As they continue to review this measure, please know that they will keep your views in mind.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact me regarding this matter of mutual concern. It is my hope that you will continue to keep me apprised of your interest in legislative issues important to you.

With best wishes and personal regards, I am

Bill Young

Member of Congress

[purple]

Don't ya just hate form letters???

[LarryJ]

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June 23, 2009

Thank you for letting me know of your support for H.R. 2254, the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009. As a long-time supporter of the millions of men and women who served our nation in uniform, you can be sure that I share your interest in this regard and appreciate knowing of your thoughts.

As you know, H.R. 2254 would clarify laws regarding presumption of exposure to certain herbicides, such as Agent Orange, while serving in Vietnam. This legislation has been referred to the House Veteran's Affairs Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs where it awaits further consideration. Because of your interest in this matter, and in an effort to be of all possible assistance to you, I have taken the liberty of sharing your support for the Agent Orange Equity Act with my colleagues on the subcommittee. As they continue to review this measure, please know that they will keep your views in mind.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact me regarding this matter of mutual concern. It is my hope that you will continue to keep me apprised of your interest in legislative issues important to you.

With best wishes and personal regards, I am

Bill Young

Member of Congress

Yeah, right!

Like doncha just KNOW that he went straight to the Committee meeting and told them that he got this one constituent that is really on top of this thing and we need to pass it!

Sorry, but I don't have much "faith" in our selected officials.

[Pete53]

Sometimes its letters that make a difference. I commend Carlie for writing.

[Notorious Kelly]

Good for you Carlie; you're doing something more than just griping in a forum.

[purple]

I agree it's great to write...I just hate the form letter responses. Sometimes I even go so far as to ask for a "non-form letter" response. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But I usually ask.

And I encourage everyone to write...I hope my comment wasn't taken wrong.

[LarryJ]

I'm sorry, Carlie, if I sounded, well, whatever I sounded like.

I am proud of you for at least takin' the bull by the horns.

(but I still don't trust those sob's, none of 'em.......but, that's just me).

[Stretch]

Here is the response from my congressman.

Here is a picture of VN in the background. I am sitting on the wing. It is hard to see the shore for the clouds on a sunny day. The horizon at sea is 17 miles.

The Brown stuff in the intake and on the wheel cowls isn't hydraulic fluid, it is something that was produced from the air as the aircraft flew in bombing missions over VN. Most flight-deck VN Blue-water Vets wore fatigues.

Edited June 24, 2009 by Stretch (see edit history)

[Chuck75]

After looking at the shipboard pictures, I'd have to first agree that A/C returning from flights over or in Vietnam (missions that landed in Vietnam) may have been contaminated with lots of things.

The over land haze or mist is normal, and likely not an indication of A>O. spraying, unless the spraying A/C are visible. Of greater concern to me is that Navy ships of the Vietnam era had water desalinization and purification systems that not only did not remove chemical contaminants such as A.O., they may have concentrated it in the linings of fresh water tanks. If a ship was in sight of land, in and around such places as the delta and Da Nang harbor, A.O runoff from the rivers was most likely present, and ingested by the water desalinization and purification systems.

I was in the rivers and delta for some months in 1967-1968 on an LST.

The LST used "voids" (empty watertight compartments, sometimes used to ballast) to first store the water from the rivers. After letting the muck settle out, the water was run through a large "membrane filter" (Army Equipment),

Then run through the ships evaporator/condenser system before it was "safe" to drink. The water was then pumped into fresh water tanks. The problem that no one admitted to was that the linings of the fresh water tanks, and even the steel tank walls would, over time, retain residual amounts of such things as A.O.

Only the Australian government has admitted to the problem, and the resulting A.O. exposure of sailors that may have never been anywhere near Vietnam.

Then, there is the matter of A.O. exposure on stateside military bases. The de comissioned Treasure Island Navy Base is a prime example of a stateside base and EPA Superfund site known to have dioxin contamination.

The contamination at T.I, in part is at the old fire fighting school site. Thousands of Vietnam era sailors were sent through this school for a refresher fire fighting training before they were sent to the far east and Vietnam.

Here is the response from my congressman.

Here is a picture of VN in the background. I am sitting on the wing. It is hard to see the shore for the clouds on a sunny day. The horizon at sea is 17 miles.

The Brown stuff in the intake and on the wheel cowls isn't hydraulic fluid, it is something that was produced from the air as the aircraft flew in bombing missions over VN. Most flight-deck VN Blue-water Vets wore fatigues.

[Pete53]

I was stationed in Budingen Germany and I am positive that Agent Orange was stored and used. Being Air Cav almost all the Officers had already served in Viet Nam and Agent Orange was used to keep weeds down on Post and outside post. Remember that Army did not like to see a cigarette but much less a weed in the wrong place.

I saw the barrels we used one of them with some plywood on top to play cards on. We were also exposed to solvents and other nasty stuff not to mention the nukes they kept on the post.

[Stretch]

The entire aircraft had to cleaned by hand with rags and waterless cleaner. The intake duct was spotless after cleaning. We had to crawl up in there, all the way back to the engine, and rub it spotless. I had more that one strange growth cut from my hands, in my SMR.

I also was told by a Navy Doctor how to treat the numerous wrist ganglions, at least 10 times, that kept forming on my right wrist while in service. He told me bend my wrist at a 45 and smash it against the wall real hard, or put my hand on a table and smash it with a hard cover book. This did work, but it was very painful. I have not had ganglions since leaving the service although I have had several cyst and grows removed (documented).

This picture was taken in VN from inside the intake duct after it was cleaned by hand. courtesy Robert Jayne.

[carlie]

I am not nearly obtuse enough to even imagine that

my one little letter to a Congressman's office will

have any impact what-so-ever on the passing of this bill.

BUT

I truly do strongly feel that if say if 5 or 10 thousand of these

letters were sent by constituents in hundereds of districts,

this would show enough interest to put a bit more pressure

on them to pass this bill.

So I ask that each of you here take the small task upon yourself's

to join with other veteran's and help our voice's to be heard.

To just sit around and complain does nothing to help get this bill passed.

It takes maybe 15 minutes of your time.

I challenge all members to show your support for HR 2254 and post

your response from your Congressperson.

carlie

[Stretch]

If a person is interested, then the person can track the winds of VN with this weather forecast. For the two years that I tracked VN weather, the winds were mostly toward the gulf, in an eastern direction, many times at 30 miles per hour.

We had monsoons that came from the west and rained on all AC Carriers and escorts, ferociously, for a few hours and were gone just like that. I have logs records of typhoons while we were there. Many times our clothes were soaked from the rain, and we had to be up there rain or shine.

http://weather.msn.com/local.aspx?wealocat...M&setunit=F

Many days the coast line was clear and plainfully visible.

AT's had to set in longitudes and latitudes for the roller map display in our squadron aircraft. Aviation Electronics Techs had to take care of and program navigational equipment. I was an AT/Plane Captain.

I know about the desalinization situation, but there were more ways of exposure that were also direct that have not even been considered. I also know that more Navy suffer the symptoms of exposure than do Army.

Our Aircraft Carriers were water poor. USS Ranger left SF for VN with only two boilers, out of eight, working for ships operations on our cruise. Steam was used in the Catapults and took the lion share of water. The evaporators did make our own water. We were forced, under supervision watch, to take three minute showers.

These 3 minutes showers were...water on 1 minute, water off 1 minutes for soap down, and water on 1 minute for rinse. It was a strictly enforced rule. I cheated once, just out of rebellion after a monsoon left the stickiness on my face all day, and I kept the water on for two minutes. When we pulled into port almost everyone cheated. I did not like it when I was the watch as everyone complained.

I know that some exposure issues are given more light that others, but this is no reason for minimizing one kind of exposure over another. That is what Congressman Filners Bill, H.R. 2254, is all about.