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Speak
Out
Speaker's Stand ... Star's opinion short on data
By Craig Williams
10-31-2006
Re "2010, and safely" (Editorial, Sept. 20):
It doesn't take long for the reader to see that the editorial is an expression of The Star's hope for a safe completion of chemical weapons destruction in Bynum by the year 2010. Such hope on the part of The Star's editorial staff could very well provide comfort and reassurance to the residents in communities around the Anniston Army Depot if the editorial were to also provide any justification for confidence in such a possibility.
Unfortunately, The Star's opinion is short of actual data and long on assumptions. Over the years a completion date for incinerating Anniston's stockpile has been a moving target. When the national incineration program began, the Army predicted completion at all sites by 1994. The date has been moved forward so often, it's no wonder Tim Garrett doesn't want to "discuss timelines." Additionally, Garrett may not want to discuss the latest official prediction for completion at Anniston, provided by the Army to Congress in April of this year -- 2016.
While Star editors may be gullible enough to believe that it is because the Army is putting safety over schedule that they won't make any timeline predictions, others should wonder what kind of information is being studied for the editors to have such optimism. No hard operational data, no monitoring records, no worker incident reports, no non-compliance reports, no engineering changes, et al., were presented in the editorial to back up The Star's position that safety comes first.
In the one incident that was cited, the editorial authors said, "The Army seems to have taken the proper corrective measures." Such equivocation doesn't reflect the authors having certain and precise knowledge that the proper measures were indeed taken or that the authors know much of anything about what really goes on at the incinerator.
However, I empathize with their plight -- writing the editorial without precise knowledge. I strongly doubt that, even if they had asked the Army for actual operational data on which to base their opinions, they would have been given any.
Almost three years ago, the Chemical Weapons Working Group, along with our local allies, formally requested of the Army's Chemical Materials Agency (CMA) that specific informational updates on the Anniston facility be provided to the community. This request for safety information included: data on operational availability; number and causes of agent alarms; worker incidents/accidents; permit non-compliance reports; engineering changes, and so on. To date NONE of this information has been provided. If operations at the Anniston facility are safe, I would think that the Army would gladly prove it by sharing this information with the community.
Let's look at stack emissions. Of the 89 identified toxic substances of concern that are chronically emitted from the incinerator, no toxicological information is available on 53 of them. There is no information on what health effects these chemicals may have on local residents who are exposed to them year after year after year. Worse, the amounts of the 89 chemicals known to be emitted through the Anniston smokestacks are not measured during day-to-day operations. Monitors to measure these toxins are only in place during trial burns, which last for a couple of days.
I have to wonder exactly on what criteria did the editorial authors base the opinion that operations at the Anniston chemical weapons incinerator are safe. Did they rely solely on assurances from the Army? It seems a fool's decision, to put confidence in assurances from the same military establishment that has over the years lied about the health effects from any number of toxic experiments, including nuclear testing, Agent Orange, depleted uranium, chemical agent testing on their own soldiers, to name just a few. And I pray that the author(s) didn't simply use the "body bag" yardstick as a measure for their confidence.
Given the lack of hard data in The Star's editorial I can merely surmise that leading up to it The Star asked the Army, "Are you doing things safely?" Army officials replied, "Yes, we are." And it was this assurance that allowed The Star to then editorialize about how wonderful it is that safety is the Army's top priority -- without research, without data, without investigation.
But I am not surprised. As Dennis Love noted in his book, My City Was Gone, it was The Star that defended and provided the cover for the incineration project from the very beginning.
Craig Williams is director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group in Berea, Ky.