Texas Vietnam Veteran Doesn't Want You To Miss His Truck

Have you seen it? The story behind a patriotic truck rolling around North Texas
WFFA ABC 8 News
Hannah Davis
July 13, 2017

It's hard to miss Everett Floyd especially when he's in his truck. The Vietnam veteran and his pickup have become local celebrities across North Texas. The F-150 is covered from top to bottom in medals, flags and military ornaments.

It's hard to miss Everett Floyd especially when he's in his truck. The F-150 is covered from top to bottom in medals, flags and military ornaments.

(Photo: Plano Health and Fitness, WFAA)

"They all have a meaning," Floyd said.

Floyd says hundreds of people have asked to take pictures over the years, but few ask the story behind the head-to-toe decorations. He says it's a symbol for the sacrifices all soldiers have made, but especially the men and women who served in Vietnam.

"Some mark the men who didn't come home," Floyd said.

Floyd served two tours in Vietnam in the Marines. He says he suffered from agent orange while there, and now has disabilities from his service.
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Vietnam Veteran's 67 Corvette Sold for $675K?

Vietnam War hero's dream Corvette fetches $675K at auction
The Indianapolis Star
USA TODAY NETWORK
John Tuohy
May 21, 2017

INDIANAPOLIS — A marina blue 1967 Chevrolet Corvette Coupe bought by a Vietnam War hero and maintained by his son sold for $675,000 at an Indianapolis auction Saturday.

The unrestored sports car, with 8,553 miles on it, was bought by Carmel, Ind., resident Gary Runyon at Dana Mecum’s 30th Spring Classic at the State Fairgrounds.

"It was very exciting but also very, very difficult," to part with the car, said its owner, Matt Litavsky. "It was all kind of a haze."
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Jasper family mourns loss of Vietnam War Vet

Jasper family mourns loss of Vietnam War Vet from chemical warfare
KBMT
Juan Rodriguez
April 8, 2017

JASPER - The chemical attack in Syria hits too close to home for one Jasper family.

The Chenyworth’s are preparing to say goodbye to their beloved husband and father, who died after decades of fighting the deadly Agent Orange chemical.

“I would love to hear him call me one more time, I spent my first time alone last night,” says Connie Chenyworth, wife of the Vietnam Veteran Roy Chenyworth.

Tears flowing down at a flower shop, a Jasper family mourning the loss of their beloved hero.

“It's so hard, I just miss him,” Connie explains.

77-year-old Roy Chenyworth was a Vietnam Veteran, he passed away due to health complications after being exposed to the warfare chemical while overseas.

Agent Orange is a powerful mixture of chemicals used by the United States military to eliminate forest cover for troops, as well as crops used to feed them.

“Very hazardous to all the services man then were there, they have a lot of Vietnam Veterans with this even if they weren’t in direct contact or exposed,” says Stacy Hartstine, oldest daughter of the Cheney’s.
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Vietnam Blue Water Veterans Fight for Justice

Target 8: Navy Vietnam veterans in Port Richey fight for benefits taken away
WFLA 8 News
Steve Andrews
March 17, 2017

“These veterans were promised that they would be cared for.” Susie Belanger

PORT RICHEY, Fla. (WFLA) – More than 231 members of Congress are backing efforts to reinstate benefits that the V.A. stripped from sailors who served in the waters off Vietnam.

With the stroke of a V.A. pen, Agent Orange presumptive disease benefits that Congress and President George W. Bush granted to those veterans vanished.

Susie Belanger, Special Projects Director for the Blue Water Navy Association, isn’t having that.

“Why are you discriminating against this whole class of veterans?” she asks.

From a motor coach in Port Richey, she is working Congress.

Those 231 members of the House of Representatives are now co-sponsoring a bill, HR-299, to restore the benefits.

According to Belanger, Vietnam veterans are running out of time. They’re not in their 20s and 30s anymore. She thinks it’s time America honors its commitment to them.
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Agent Orange: Florida veteran claims 40-year cover-up by Air Force

Florida veteran claims 40-year cover-up by Air Force
WFLA Staff Reports
Published: December 22, 2016

PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) — A former U.S. Air Force pilot called it the great betrayal.

Scott Nelms claims a 40-year cover-up by the Air Force may have cost veterans and their families dearly. Nelms said the USAF sprayed significant amounts of the toxic defoliant Agent Orange at bases in Thailand.

The Pinellas County veteran has accused the Department of Veterans Affairs of stonewalling veterans who served in Thailand and ignoring facts about what and when they suffered exposure.

Nelms points to a now-declassified 1973 report that said significant use of defoliants occurred on U.S. bases in Thailand. The Project CHECO Southeast Asia report “Base Defense in Thailand” also stated the defoliants were used inside the perimeter of bases.

Nelms flew about 100 missions out of Thailand, refueling fighter jets and bombers during the Vietnam War. His new mission is getting out the word that U.S. veterans who served in Thailand were exposed to significant amounts of Agent Orange.

Nelms was stationed at U-Tapeo Air Force Base. “I had no idea they were spraying Agent Orange in Thailand,” he said.
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Widow of Vietnam Veteran Finally Receives Benefits After 24 years!

Vietnam veteran's widow finally sees survivor benefits
Tulsa World
By Randy Ellis The Oklahoman
Posted: Monday, November 21, 2016

80-year-old widow spent 24 years before Veterans Affairs changed its view

CHICKASHA — Twenty-four years of persistence have finally paid off for the Chickasha widow of a Vietnam War veteran. After rejecting her survivor’s benefit claims for more than two decades, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has finally acknowledged that wartime exposure to Agent Orange likely contributed to her husband’s death from heart disease.

Along with the admission came $291,000 in retroactive survivor’s benefits.
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Vietnam Veterans: Did you serve with Rob Stevens of Minnesota in 1969?

AMAZING UPDATE!

How a stranger’s generosity helped a desperate Vietnam veteran
KTVA News
By Liz Raines Photojournalist: Ken Kulovany
November 22, 2016

ANCHORAGE – We first introduced you to Robert Stevens in a Problem Solvers piece on Friday. For the last three years, he and his wife, Diane, have been trying to get benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Robert Stevens was exposed to the toxic herbicide known as Agent Orange while serving in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War. Now, their lives have taken a turn for the better because of one person who saw that story.

When we last met the Stevenses, they were drowning in debt.

“They just turned us into collections because I’ve gotten to a point where there’s so many medical bills for Bob,” Diane Stevens said. “I just can’t do it anymore.”

Robert Stevens believes he was exposed to Agent Orange while making his way through Vietnam after receiving orders to return home to Minnesota on April 1, 1969.

“I had a quadruple bypass,” Robert Stevens explained. “And my heart doctor said it was from Agent Orange.”

In order to get any money from the VA, the Stevens have to prove he stepped foot on Vietnamese soil. However, the VA can’t find his records, so Robert and Diane Stevens are now searching for anyone who might still recognize him from that time.

Diane Stevens posted a cry for help on a reunion page for her husband’s ship, the USS Lynde McCormick. The Stevenses haven’t received a response yet, but someone else in the community was listening to their story.

One KTVA viewer was so moved by the couple’s story that he wanted to give them a check for $3,800.
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A desperate endeavor: Vietnam veteran seeks community’s help getting benefits
KTVA News
By Liz Raines
Photojournalist: Rachel McPherron
November 19, 2016

ANCHORAGE – I first met Rob and Diane Stevens at a Department of Veterans Affairs listening session in September. Diane fought back tears as she told the Alaska VA’s new director, Timothy Ballard, of her and her husband’s now three-year battle to obtain some sort of compensation for Robert’s exposure to Agent Orange.

The Vietnam War ended in 1975, but the heroism of those who served lives on today. The soldiers wear hats now instead of helmets. Robert does so proudly. At the tender age of 17, he joined the U.S. Navy.

“I got to know the guys, the medic,” Robert recalled. “And I was like, ‘I really want to do that.’ And everybody kept telling me, ‘no, you don’t want to do that.'”

Robert spent two years in Vietnam, days he remembers with nostalgia. But there’s one day he’ll never forget: April 1,1969 — his 21st birthday.

“I got handed four sheets of paper and they said ‘your dad’s been in a car accident,'” Robert remembered.

He was sent home to Minnesota to be with his family, but to get there he had to first pass through Vietnam from Vung Tau to Saigon. That’s where Robert’s life changed forever.

“Two helicopters flew over and they dropped this white powder,” Robert said.

That white powder, he believes, was Agent Orange — an herbicide the U.S. Government used to destroy jungles during the war so it could see the enemy. Now the VA recognizes that Agent Orange destroyed a lot more.
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Disabled Vietnam Veteran Alan Meisel Beaten By Sex Offenders?

update

Senators demand investigation into disabled veteran's death Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst sent a letter Friday to the secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, asking him to look into the circumstances of Alan Meisel’s death. The senators referred to a Des Moines Sunday Register article about Meisel, who lived for decades in Iowa before moving to Texas in 2013 to be near a brother-in-law.

How did Iowa veteran end up dead in Texas
Des Moines Register
Tony Leys
October 1, 2016

SPRINGTOWN, Texas — Alan Meisel’s Iowa friends can’t imagine how he came to spend his final months here, stuck in a rundown rental house with two paroled sex offenders instead of in a nursing home.

Meisel, who lived in Des Moines much of his life, wasn’t a criminal. He was a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War, who qualified for a significant disability pension and free health care from the Department of Veterans Affairs. He was exposed to the chemical Agent Orange during the war, sparking a severe form of Parkinson’s disease that left him barely able to walk, talk or eat, his friends say. It also left him unable to defend himself last March, when two roommates in the Texas rental house allegedly shoved him out of his wheelchair and beat him black and blue, according to sheriff's investigators.

The 68-year-old veteran died three weeks after the alleged attack. A medical examiner listed “natural causes” for his death, but the autopsy report notes numerous scabs and yellowing bruises on his arms, legs and face. Just 102 pounds remained on his 5-foot-7-inch frame.

His friends back in Iowa aren’t satisfied with the fact that the two roommates are charged with assaulting Meisel. They see the tragedy as an example of how a vulnerable person can be neglected if no one speaks up on his behalf.

They want to know how he ended up in the rental home, which they believe was grossly inadequate for his medical needs. Why was he no longer in a nursing home with professional care? Why wasn't his veteran status enough to guarantee him that care? What happened to his money?
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Vietnam Veteran Died Days After Being Honored

Vietnam vet, honored Saturday, dies Thursday
Great Falls Tribune
Tribune Staff
July 14, 2016

Ronald Doney sits with his tile on Saturday to be installed at the Montana Veterans Memorial. Doney died at home Thursday in Great Falls.

(Photo: Tribune Photo/Anissa Keith)

Ronald “Cree” Doney, 71, a Vietnam War veteran whose health was compromised by exposure to the chemical Agent Orange, died at home Thursday in Great Falls after a long illness.

A rosary and wake will be held at 7 p.m. Friday, and funeral services will be 11 a.m. Saturday, both at Sacred Heart Church in Fort Belknap. See his obituary in Friday's Montana section of the Tribune.
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Virginia Pilot 'Help Us Investigate the Impact of Agent Orange'

Reliving Agent Orange: What the children of Vietnam vets have to say
The Virginian-Pilot
by Terry Parris Jr. and Charles Ornstein, ProPublica, and Mike Hixenbaugh
June 17, 2016

The children of Vietnam vets describe how they believe their fathers’ exposure to Agent Orange during the war has impacted their families and their health.

For the past year, ProPublica and The Virginian-Pilot have examined how Agent Orange has impacted the health of Vietnam vets. We’ve written about Blue Water Navy veterans who are currently ineligible for benefits, as well as vets with bladder cancer and their struggle for compensation.

Help Us Investigate the Impact of Agent Orange

We’ve also asked vets and their family members to tell us how their lives have been affected by exposure to the toxic herbicide, receiving more than 5,000 responses.

ProPublica and The Virginian-Pilot are looking into the multigenerational effects of Agent Orange. Please fill out the corresponding questionnaire if you are:
A veteran
Child of a veteran
Family member of a veteran
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Linked from Stars and Stripes

This is something we worry about all the time.  We keep worrying about every time he goes to the VA for tests. In 1993 my husband was entered into the registry because there was spraying when he was in Vietnam and where he was. The doctor said the words, "No adverse health effects yet." In other words, we knew there will be.

There are obvious risks to those who go into combat. Bullets and bombs are always on the minds of soldiers. What is not on their minds is that the government would risk their lives with what they do.

Agent Orange was supposed to save lives by getting rid of places for the enemy to hide.  It turned out that was what caused a lot more deaths, not just for those who survived Vietnam, but for their families as well.

Vietnam Veterans Fighting Agent Orange and Bladder Cancer Plus VA Over Claims

Armed with new research, Vietnam vets push VA to link bladder cancer to Agent Orange 
By Mike Hixenbaugh, The Virginian-Pilot
and Charles Ornstein and Terry Parris Jr., ProPublica
April 27, 2016

Eller is one of about 5,000 veterans and family members who’ve shared their Agent Orange exposure stories with ProPublica and The Virginian-Pilot over the past several months. More than 125 of them said they’ve been diagnosed with bladder cancer. Hundreds more reported having one or more of the other conditions being reviewed by the VA.

Alan Eller has spent more than a decade trying to convince the Department of Veterans Affairs that his bladder cancer was the result of exposure to Agent Orange almost 50 years ago in Vietnam.

The Army vet has filed three claims with the agency, most recently in 2014, since a doctor told him the cancer was likely tied to the toxic herbicide.

Each time, even as he found additional doctors to vouch for the link between his cancer and his service, the VA rejected Eller’s claim, arguing there was no proof.

But a report last month by a prominent committee of scientists said there’s now research suggesting otherwise. As a result, the VA is studying whether it should reverse its position and add the condition to the list of illnesses it presumes to be linked to Agent Orange, which the U.S. sprayed across Vietnam during the war.
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Service Dog Charity Remembers Vietnam Veterans Have PTSD Too

SLO Vietnam War vet gets service dog from nonprofit
San Luis Obispo News
Nick Wilson
April 1, 2016

Hulin, 67, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and has had difficulty doing daily tasks since his right leg was amputated a year and a half ago. Hulin said doctors believe the herbicide Agent Orange, which he was exposed to in Vietnam, contributed to health complications that led to the loss of his leg.

Bruce Hulin’s dog, Nichols, comforts him and helps him pick up dropped items and open doors

The San Luis Obispo-based nonprofit, Paws for a Cause, has raised $40,000 to help train dogs for war veterans

It takes one to two years of intense work to train a service dog

They say a dog is a man’s best friend. Dogs also can save lives, according to a local nonprofit group that connects dogs with veterans.

Cayucos-based Paws for a Cause has raised $40,000 and partnered with the San Luis Obispo-based nonprofit New Life K9s to provide service dogs to veterans — and, as a result, help prevent suicide, improve their relationships with those in the community, offer assistance and emotional support, and reduce homelessness.

The organization says dogs are the perfect buddies for those who have been hurt — physically or emotionally — by war because their loyalty and friendship is unconditional.

San Luis Obispo resident Bruce Hulin, a Vietnam War veteran and amputee, officially was awarded his new service dog, a yellow lab named Nichols, in an emotional ceremony at a Los Osos Rotary Club meeting Friday at La Palapa restaurant in Los Osos. Hulin is the fourth veteran to receive a service dog from Paws for a Cause.
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More Agent Orange Research Needed on Vietnam Veterans Kids

Researchers call for more study of Agent Orange's effects on Vietnam veterans and their kids
The Virginian-Pilot
By Mike Hixenbaugh
and Charles Ornstein, ProPublica
March 10, 2016

”Although progress has been made in understanding the health effects of exposure to the chemicals,” the committee members wrote near the end of the 1,115-page report, there are still “significant gaps in our knowledge.”

More than two decades of studying Agent Orange exposure hasn’t produced a solid understanding of how the toxic herbicide has harmed Vietnam War veterans and possibly their children, according to a report released Thursday.

Additional research is long overdue, the report said, but the federal government hasn’t done it.

Those are among the conclusions of a committee of researchers that, since 1991, has been charged by Congress with reviewing all available research into the effects of Agent Orange, which the U.S. military sprayed by the millions of gallons in Vietnam to kill forests and destroy enemy cover.

Over the years, the biennial reports produced by the committee have identified numerous illnesses linked to the herbicide, in some cases leading the Department of Veterans Affairs to extend disability compensation to thousands more veterans.

The committee members’ parting thoughts about the lack of necessary research offered a wake-up call to a federal bureaucracy and researchers who have largely moved on from studying the health consequences of a war that ended 40 years ago.
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Navy Veterans Want Navy to Fight For Them After Agent Orange Struck

Sick Navy vets hunt for decades-old records to prove they should get Agent Orange benefits 
The Virginian-Pilot
By Mike Hixenbaugh
Charles Ornstein
Terry Parris Jr.
ProPublica
1 hr ago

“It's hell,” said Ed Marciniak, of Pensacola, Fla., who served aboard the Norfolk-based USS Jamestown during the war. “The Navy should be going to the VA and telling them, ‘This is how people got aboard the ship, this is where they got off, this is how they operated.’ Instead, they put that burden on old, sick, dying veterans, or worse – their widows.”

During the Vietnam War, hundreds of U.S. Navy ships crossed into Vietnam's rivers or sent crew members ashore, possibly exposing their sailors to the toxic herbicide Agent Orange. But more than 40 years after the war’s end, the U.S. government doesn't have a full accounting of which ships traveled where, adding hurdles and delays for sick Navy veterans seeking compensation.

The Navy could find out where each of its ships operated during the war, but it hasn’t. The U.S. Department of Veteran’s Affairs says it won’t either, instead choosing to research ship locations on a case-by-case basis, an extra step that veterans say can add months – even years – to an already cumbersome claims process. Bills that would have forced the Navy to create a comprehensive list have failed in Congress.

Some 2.6 million Vietnam veterans are thought to have been exposed to – and possibly harmed by – Agent Orange, which the U.S. military used to defoliate dense forests, making it easier to spot enemy troops. But vets are only eligible for VA compensation if they went on land – earning a status called “boots on the ground” – or if their ships entered Vietnam’s rivers, however briefly.
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Veteran Poisoned by Agent Orange Finally Gets VA Disability

Veteran wins benefits after FOX 2 Agent Orange report
FOX 2 Now
BY CHRIS HAYES
FEBRUARY 29, 2016

Casto emailed us this morning, after our follow up interview, with even better news. He titled the e-mail "we won!" and went on to explain that the VA awarded him a 70% overall disability rating. He said after seven years of dealing with the VA on this, he believes he's now won the battle.

(KTVI) - A military veteran suspected to have been exposed to Agent Orange feared the VA would deny him benefits, waiting for him to die. Now a huge change since our story after an unexpected government response.

One week after our FOX Files investigation about vets denied benefits for exposure to Agent Orange, Bill Casto received a 27 page letter with a surprising acknowledgement.

Casto read from the letter, “It says ‘VA memorandum, herbicide exposure conceded dated February 5 2016.’ After all these years since 2009, when I originally filed my claim they`re admitting now that I was exposed to herbicide.”

He got the letter February 5th, one week after our report when Casto told us, “Deny, deny, deny until you die is what we say.”

67-years old and hooked to oxygen, he suspected the VA may be waiting him out.

Casto said, “There`s thousands of us in the same boat, thousands of us.”
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Florida Vietnam Veteran Still Looking For Answers

This is a confusing report to read. While it addresses some of the issues veterans should never, even have to face, like paying out of pocket for what should be done by the VA, it has the years leaving more questions. It says this Vietnam veteran received bad news from a VA doctor about cancer and advised to not wait to get treated for it. That was in 2008. Then it talks about canceled appointments in 2015 along with a drop in his disability.

Vietnam veteran: I want answers!
WFTV 9 News
by: Staff writer, Charlotte Sun
Feb 9, 2016

Bob Conetta loves America.

He would give anything to his country.

When he received his draft notice, he went into the U.S. Army and was sent to Vietnam, serving with the 1st Air Cavalry Division.

On July 20, 1968, outside Hue City, he gave his left leg, his right eye and most of his hearing when a mine was detonated near him.

This did not stop Conetta. He served as the financial secretary for the Utility Workers Union of America, Locals 1-2, in New York City. He was instrumental in creating Operation Family Reunion, a program that brings family members to Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C., to be with their loved one who has sustained serious wounds.

Despite his injuries, he moved forward with his life.

'Get the procedure done on my own’

After he retired and relocated to Punta Gorda, Conetta was diagnosed with prostate cancer -- one of the 15 presumptive conditions from Agent Orange.

On July 2, 2008, he had bloodwork.

On July 14, 2008, he had a biopsy.

On Aug. 26, 2008, he was scheduled for a bone scan -- six weeks after his biopsy that proved he had prostate cancer.

Conetta said the Department of Veterans Affairs doctor said he put him in for the bone scan but his cancer was aggressive, saying, "I implore you not to wait."
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VA Still Denies Navy Veterans Agent Orange Claims

Veterans Affairs again denies Agent Orange benefits to Navy vets
Virginia Pilot
By By Charles Ornstein and Terry Parris Jr.
ProPublica
22 hrs ago

“Rather than siding with veterans, VA is doubling down on an irrational and inconsistent policy,” Senator Richard Blumenthal

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has once again turned down an effort by Navy veterans to get compensation for possible exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.

In a document released Friday, the VA said it would continue to limit benefits related to Agent Orange exposure to only those veterans who set foot in Vietnam, where the herbicide was sprayed, and to those who were on boats in inland rivers.

The VA compensates these veterans for a litany of associated illnesses, including diabetes, various cancers, Parkinson’s disease, peripheral neuropathy and a type of heart disease.

Advocates for some 90,000 so-called Blue Water Navy veterans who served off the coast of Vietnam have been asking the VA for more than a decade to broaden the policy to include them. They say they were exposed to Agent Orange because their ships sucked in potentially contaminated water and distilled it for showering, drinking, laundry and cooking. Experts have said the distillation process could have actually concentrated the Agent Orange, which contained the toxic chemical dioxin and was used to kill vegetation and deny enemy cover.
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Share your story

ProPublica and the Virginian-Pilot are interested in hearing from veterans and family members for our ongoing investigation into the effects of Agent Orange on veterans and their children.

Vietnam Veteran Memorial's In Memory Program

Veteran 'carried the sorrow; he carried the pain' 
Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky. (Tribune News Service)
By Don Wilkins
Published: February 6, 2016

For Vietnam veterans who died later, the criteria are post traumatic stress disorder, exposure to Agent Orange and similar chemicals, diabetes, cancer, heart attack and cholangiocarcinoma. An application can be found at Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund and inclusion is free.

Sharon Westerfield didn't see her late husband, Larry Westerfied, receive the honor he deserved for serving his country in Vietnam.

But she will see it in June when her husband, who died in 2012 at age 63, becomes part of the Vietnam Veteran Memorial's In Memory program in Washington, D.C.

Westerfield will be going to the nation's capital to participate in the 18th annual ceremony June 18.

"I feel like he carried Vietnam with him emotionally and physically all of those years," Westerfield said about why she applied to be part of the program. "He carried the sorrow; he carried the pain. I feel like he deserves the recognition as much as those on The Wall because they died quickly."

Larry Westerfield served in Vietnam from 1969 to 1970 as a member of the Army's 14th Engineer Battalion. The Westerfields, of Owensboro, were married in March 1971.

Westerfield said her husband experienced the backlash that came from being a Vietnam soldier.
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Linked from Stars and Stripes

VA Expands List of "Brown Water" Agent Orange Claims

VA updates list of Navy ships presumptive for Agent Orange exposure
Military Times
By Patricia Kime, Staff writer
November 25, 2015

A Navy river patrol boat crewman mans a .50-caliber machine gun on the Go Cong River in 1967.
(Photo: National Archives)

The Department of Veterans Affairs has expanded its list of Navy ships whose crews may be eligible for disability compensation as a result of exposure to the toxic defoliant Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.

VA announced Monday it has added ships to the “Brown Water” inventory, meaning the vessels were found to have operated on inland waterways and all personnel who served aboard them are presumed to have been exposed to Agent Orange.

The new additions include the Navy survey ships Sheldrake and Towhee, attack transport ship Okanogan, submarine rescue ship Chanticleer, destroyers Frank Knox and James E. Kyes, and transport ship General W. A. Mann.
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Exposures Agent Orange
During your Vietnam tour, did your ship or boat have one of the following designations?
AGP (Assault Group Patrol/Patrol Craft Tender)
LCM (Landing Craft, Mechanized)
LCU (Landing Craft, Utility)
LCVP (Landing Craft, Vehicle, Personnel)
LST (Landing Ship, Tank)
PBR (Patrol Boat, River)
PCF (Patrol Craft, Fast or Swift Boat)
PG (Patrol Gunboat)
STABS (Strike Assault Boats)
WAK (Cargo Vessel)
WHEC (High Endurance Cutter)
WLB (Buoy Tender)
WPB (Patrol Boat)
YFU (Harbor Utility Craft)

Vietnam Veteran 7 1/2 Year Wait For Agent Orange Testing

Local veteran waits on Agent Orange testing for 7 1/2 years
First Coast News
Ken Amaro
November 23, 2015

ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. -- During the Vietnam War, 20 million gallons of Agent Orange was dumped on Vietnam and parts of Cambodia.

Bill Harnage, 65, now retired after 20 years of service in the Army and the National Guard, said he was in the line of some of the dumping. "I was a gray water soldier.

The area we were Agent Orange was in use."

The Vietnam veteran is on a new mission. He wants to be tested for exposure to the herbicide

"I asked to be tested, but never did get it," he said.

In 2008, the former Army medic made his request in writing to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. It was sent to the VA Medical Center in Gainesville and received. But, he said, nothing happened.

"They don't know why it wasn't addressed," said Harnage.

The irony is every year he goes to the VA for his annual physical exam. He said at no time was he asked to take or was he given an Agent Orange exam.
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Eligibility for Agent Orange Registry health exam These Veterans are eligible for the Agent Orange Registry health exam:

Vietnam
Veterans who served in Vietnam between 1962 and 1975, regardless of length of time. Veterans who served aboard smaller river patrol and swift boats that operated on the inland waterways of Vietnam (also known as “Brown Water Veterans”). Check VA's list of U.S. Navy and Coast Guard ships that operated in Vietnam.

Korea
Veterans who served in a unit in or near the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) anytime between April 1, 1968 and August 31, 1971.

Thailand
U.S. Air Force Veterans who served on Royal Thai Air Force (RTAF) bases near U-Tapao, Ubon, Nakhon Phanom, Udorn, Takhli, Korat, and Don Muang, near the air base perimeter anytime between February 28, 1961 and May 7, 1975.

U.S. Army Veterans who provided perimeter security on RTAF bases in Thailand anytime between February 28, 1961 and May 7, 1975.

U.S. Army Veterans who were stationed on some small Army installations in Thailand anytime between February 28, 1961 and May 7, 1975. However, the Army Veteran must have been a member of a military police (MP) unit or was assigned a military occupational specialty whose duty placed him or her at or near the base perimeter.