Decades Later, U.s. Military Pollution In Philippines Linked To Deaths

[allan]

Decades later, U.S. military pollution in Philippines linked to deaths

By Travis J. Tritten <mailto:trittent@pstripes.osd.mil> , Stars and Stripes

Pacific edition, Tuesday, February 2, 2010

CLARK AIR BASE, Philippines - The U. S. military is long gone from bases in

the Philippines, but its legacy remains buried here.

Toxic waste was spilled on the ground, pumped into waterways and buried in

landfills for decades at two sprawling Cold War-era bases.

Today, ice cream shops, Western-style horse ranches, hotels and public parks

have sprung up on land once used by the Air Force and the Navy - a benign

facade built on land the Philippine government said is still polluted with

asbestos, heavy metals and fuel.

Records of about 500 families who sought refuge on the deserted bases after

a 1991 volcanic eruption indicate 76 people died and 68 others were sickened

by pollutants on the bases. A study in 2000 for the Philippine Senate also

linked the toxins to "unusually high occurrence of skin disease,

miscarriages, still births, birth defects, cancers, heart ailments and

leukemia."

The 1991 base closing agreement gave the Philippines billions of dollars in

military infrastructure and real estate at the bases and in return cleared

the United States of any responsibility for the pollution. The Department of

Defense told Stars and Stripes it has no authority to undertake or pay for

environmental cleanup at the closed bases.

Philippine government efforts never gained traction. Philippine President

Joseph Estrada formed a task force in 2000 to take on the issue, but it fell

dormant and unfunded after he left office a year later. Efforts by private

groups and environmentalists to force a cleanup have largely fizzled.

After two decades, the base closing agreement has run up a troubling

environmental record. Filipinos claim exposure to U.S. pollutants has

brought suffering and death.

As the U.S. military works to become greener in the 21st century, the

Philippines stand as a dark reminder of how environmental responsibilities

can go astray overseas.

Both the Air Force and the Navy polluted haphazardly in the Philippines.

The Navy pumped 3.75 million gallons of untreated sewage each day into local

fishing and swimming waters at Subic Bay, according to a 1992 report by what

was then known as the General Accounting Office.

The bases poured fuel and chemicals from firefighting exercises directly

into the water table and used underground storage tanks without leak

detection equipment, the agency found.

At least three sites at the Subic Bay Navy base - two landfills and an

ordnance disposal area - are dangerously polluted with materials such as

asbestos, metals and fuels, the Philippines government found after an

environmental survey there.

Clark Air Base was a staging area during the Vietnam War. Its aviation and

vehicle operations contaminated eight sites with oil, petroleum lubricants,

pesticides, PCB and lead, according to a 1997 environmental survey by the

Philippine government.

Before the U.S. closed the bases, it drew up a rough bill for cleaning the

hazardous pollution.

Though they never tested the water or soil, the Air Force and the Navy

estimated cleanup at each could cost up to $25 million - the average cost of

handling the most polluted sites back in the United States, according to the

GAO.

Rose Ann Calma is believed to be one of the warning signs of pollution at

Clark Air Base.

Now 13 years old, she weighs just 32 pounds and must wear diapers. Cerebral

palsy and severe mental retardation have stolen her ability to speak or

walk.

Her mother and about 500 other families who were displaced by a volcanic

eruption in 1991 moved onto the base and set up a tent village.

They drilled shallow wells on a former motor pool site and drank the

untreated water - despite an oily sheen - until they were moved off the land

in the late 1990s.

Records of the families, published by the Philippines Senate, said 144

people were sickened at the camp, 76 of whom died.

It said at least 19 children were born with disabilities, diseases and

deformities between 1996 and 1999.

Tests in 1995 by the Philippine Department of Health confirmed wells on

Clark were contaminated with oil and grease, a byproduct of decades of

military use.

"If it is God's will, then I accept it," Rose Ann's mother, Susan Calma,

said recently.

In a village near Subic Bay, Norma Abraham, 58, holds an X-ray showing the

lung disease that killed her husband, Guillermo.

Her husband worked through the 1980s and early 1990s sorting the Navy waste

that went into local landfills, which are the most polluted sites at Subic

Bay.

Many aborigines like Abraham, who are among the poorest in a poor country,

were paid about 30 cents per day to hand-sort recyclable metals from Navy

waste that included asbestos, paint and batteries, villagers told Stars and

Stripes.

No protective equipment other than gloves was ever used, and asbestos dust

was often thick in the air, the villagers said. Sometimes, when a truck

dumped new waste for sorting, they said the workers would faint from the

toxic fumes.

Guillermo Abraham began to cough, feel tightness in his lungs and have

trouble breathing while working there, his wife said.

The lung ailment plagued him through his life and after an X-ray in January

showed he was terminally ill with lung disease, he died on May 29, Norma

Abraham said.

His disease, which mirrors asbestosis, is the most common ailment and killer

among the 70 or so families who worked with the Navy's waste, according to

the villagers.

The aborigines rarely get quality medical treatment and do not keep birth or

death records. But they compiled a list for Stars and Stripes of 41 people

who they believe died over the years from toxic exposure.

Any real chance for an environmental cleanup was scuttled by the two

governments in the agreement that gave the Philippines billions of dollars

in base infrastructure and real estate in return for absolving the United

States of any responsibility for the pollution.

As a result, the United States has no legal responsibility or authority to

conduct a cleanup, and an influential Philippines politician said that

government has little interest in the problem.

"It is not one of its priorities," said Philippine Sen. Aquilino Pimentel

Jr., a former majority leader and Senate president. "If it was, it would

have been done a long time ago."

Dolly Yanan keeps the records and photos of the gray-faced, emaciated and

disabled children believed to have been poisoned by U.S. military pollution

in the Subic Bay area.

The records count 38 deaths from disease between 2000 and 2003.

But the record-keeping has begun to lapse in recent years as hope for a

cleanup and enthusiasm for the cause recedes.

"For the past four or five years, we cannot track the leukemia," said Yanan,

who runs a community center in Olongapo City.

A coalition of citizens known as the People's Task Force for Bases Cleanup

has fought for U.S. accountability for two decades and met with a string of

disappointments.

The Philippine Senate inquiry and task force in 2000 led to no action, and a

lawsuit designed to force a U.S.-led environmental assessment survey, filed

in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco, was

thrown out in 2003.

"If only our government was strong enough, I think there would have been a

cleanup or at least an initial assessment," Yanan said. "First, it should be

our government who should have a strong will and call for a cleanup."

[Stretch]

This is a picture taken in the PI during 1970. I lived in one of the building, from time to time, on this river that separates the Navy Base from Olongopo.

These people lived up and down both sides of this river in cramped housing. There sewage went on a concrete slab and was washed into the river constantly. People wash there clothes in this river, swam in it, and traveled in it. These peoples have lived there for 100's of years.

Every Sailor that went to the PI knew this river as Shit River. A bridge went over the river connecting the base with Olongopo. Young girls under 10 years old stood up in canoes under the bridge and begged for coins, from the sailors, as they passed over. I will find a picture of one and post it. The whole river smelled putrid always.

[jbasser]

I know of a couple of drunk sailors ( San Miguel) that went swimmming in the crap.

J

[bite me]

Is either jbasser or Stretch still available? Is there any way to email either of them..Thank You.

[Stretch]

Biteme,

Welcome to hadit. This post is over 2 years old, but it is still open. You can send a PM go up to you name and click on Personal Messenger. I think that is the way to do it...

You can click on the persons name and look for the PM bar to send.

Edited February 18, 2013 by Stretch

[Navy Spook]

I love the Philippines and Filipino people. I went to high school at Subic Bay, I have a filipina wife, and I am buying a house and moving to Baguio to retire.

Filipino's, on average, suffer from dire poverty. After Mt. Pinatubo necessitated the evacuation of Clark and Subic it wasn't 48 hours before locals were on the bases taking all the metals and building materials out of the walls. Anything they thought they could sell was removed. Jet fuel tanks were tapped (and left running) and you could purchase JP-4 & JP-5 out in town. Every tank on the base was tapped and sampled. The Philippine government waited weeks to send in enough troops to contain the situation.

I am under no illusions that the US absolutely did pollute the bases. I know it to be a fact. But the degree of US responsibility in the aftermath of the natural disaster and ensuing rampant looting is much, much less than the original post would suggest.

[confusion99%]

I too spent a lot of time in the Philippines, doing 3 tours with extensions totaling over 10 years. I then went back as a civilian and spent another 6 years working for gov't contractor. Was there when Mt. Pinatubo blew up, working right under the damn thing at Camp ODonnell, working in Crow Valley. When the military left the bases (except Subic) it was the Philippine Military who did 90% of the looting for all the major items. What was left for the rest of the locals was nothing much but some scrap metal. But the equipment that cost thousands of dollars was actually fought over between military units with actual gun battles for the stuff. It was insane.

Subic was much different Mayor Gordon who was mayor of Olongapo took charge, He brought in great numbers of security and gave orders to shoot to kill anyone who MIGHT be stealing off the base. He kept the base in tact so that it could be a great economic generator after the bases were gone.

Yes there were dump sites left that should have been cleaned up. The same is true with any base here in the USA that has been closed. I hear all the noise here in San Antonio, same thing all the people living around the base that used to have jobs they couldn't be fired from who lived close to the base, did not have a problem living there until the jobs were gone. Then all of a sudden, the old base was killing them and they wanted to be paid for their problems. Amazing how it wasn't killing them when they worked on the base for 20 years.