Those who serve...paying beyond what is acceptable

Supreme Court rejects appeal over military burn pits

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: January 14, 2019

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court is rejecting appeals from military veterans who claim they suffer health problems because of open burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The justices on Monday left in place a federal appeals court ruling that more than 60 lawsuits over the burn pits could not go forward.

The lawsuits said military contractor KBR dumped tires, batteries, medical waste and other materials into open burn pits. The suits claimed the resulting smoke caused neurological problems, cancers and other health issues in more than 800 servicemembers. The complaints said at least 12 servicemembers died. #ExposedAndBetrayed
read more here

Commandant tells Coast Guard families: ‘You have not, and will not, be forgotten’

By STARS AND STRIPES
Published: January 14, 2019

Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Karl Schultz drew attention to ongoing missions around the globe and expressed his support for Coast Guard families as the service prepared for about 41,000 members to go without paychecks on Tuesday as part of the ongoing partial government shutdown.

A Coast Guard Cutter Munro crewmember embraces his children after the cutter returned home to Alameda, Calif., Dec. 24, 2018. MATTHEW MASASCHI/U.S. COAST GUARD

"While our Coast Guard workforce is deployed, there are loved ones at home reviewing family finances, researching how to get support, and weighing childcare options—they are holding down the fort," Schultz wrote on Sunday. "Please know that we are doing everything we can to support and advocate for you while your loved one stands the watch. You have not, and will not, be forgotten."
read more here

And then there is the latest news that the Congress is once again thinking about the term permanent and totally disabled should be followed up with "just kidding." They managed to cut the taxes on their wealthy friends, but now they want to cut the budgets of the disabled veterans who cannot afford to lose their compensation. Gee, wonder how much the heads of all the corporations get for their compensation after that sweetheart deal?

In other words folks...mostly cutting Vietnam veterans off at the knees!

Background

In 2017, 4.5 million veterans with medical conditions or injuries that were incurred or that worsened during active-duty service received disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). The amount of compensation such veterans receive depends on the severity of their disabilities (which are rated between zero and 100 percent in increments of 10), the number of their dependents, and other factors—but not on their income or civilian employment history.

In addition, VA may increase certain veterans' disability compensation to the 100 percent level, even though VA has not rated their service-connected disabilities at that level. To receive the supplement, termed an Individual Unemployability (IU) payment, disabled veterans must apply for the benefit and meet two criteria. First, veterans generally must be rated between 60 percent and 90 percent disabled. Second, VA must determine that veterans' disabilities prevent them from maintaining substantially gainful employment—for instance, if their employment earnings would keep them below the poverty threshold for one person. In 2017, for veterans who received the supplement, it boosted their monthly VA disability payment by an average of about $1,200. In September 2017, about 380,000 veterans received IU payments. Of those veterans, the Congressional Budget Office estimates, about 180,000 were age 67 or older. That age group has been the largest driver of growth in the program.

VA's regulations require that IU benefits be based on a veteran's inability to maintain substantially gainful employment because of the severity of a service-connected disability and not because of age, voluntary withdrawal from work, or other factors. About 48 percent of veterans receiving the IU supplement were 67 or older in September 2017, up from about 40 percent in September 2010. That rise is attributed largely to the aging of Vietnam War veterans.

But the tax cuts for the wealthy they managed to make permanent!

House passes GOP bill to make new tax cuts permanent

• Republicans have sped legislation through the House to expand their massive new tax law, capping their session for the year as they rush out of town to face voters in the November elections.
• The new bill would make permanent the individual and small-business tax cuts in the law.
• It's the second tax-cut proposal that Republican leaders have pushed in less than a year.

Burn Pits get studied today, forgotten about from all other wars

Wonder if any of these reporters are aware this is how they got rid of the same stuff in all other wars?

*******

Burn Pits Exposed: A Look at How Military Got Rid of 'Anything and Everything' on Overseas Bases

NBC 10 News
By NBC10 Investigators
Published Nov 16, 2018

They served. Now they're sick. Thousands of former soldiers claim they are suffering ill effects from the garbage disposal methods on overseas bases.

In the middle of the deserts of Iraq and Afghanistan, garbage disposal on American military bases was historically a simple thing.

"Anything and everything burned in a burn pit — from mail to dead animals to anything," Ryan Conklin, a former soldier, says.

Asbestos and other chemicals? Yes, retired Army Lt. Col. Dan Brewer, says.

Medical waste? Yes again, according to a doctor now researching the effects of burn pit dust. "It was always burning, always black smoke coming of there," another veteran, Michael Ray, says.

Several former soldiers and medical doctors spoke to NBC10 Investigators about their experiences with burn pits: large holes dug by crews who then filled the pits with trash and lit them on fire with jet fuel. For many soldiers deployed to the desert and living on bases adjacent to the debris disposal, the billowing black smoke was just part of their daily life.
read more here

Burn Pits problem known and addressed in 2004

Balad
Burn pit at Balad raises health concerns
Troops say chemicals and medical waste burned at base are making them sick, but officials deny risk
By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writerPosted : Wednesday Oct 29, 2008 16:31:18 EDT

An open-air “burn pit” at the largest U.S. base in Iraq may have exposed tens of thousands of troops, contractors and Iraqis to cancer-causing dioxins, poisons such as arsenic and carbon monoxide, and hazardous medical waste, documentation gathered by Military Times shows.
The billowing black plume from the burn pit at 15-square-mile Joint Base Balad, the central logistics hub for U.S. forces in Iraq, wafts continually over living quarters and the base combat support hospital, sources say.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/10/military_burnpit_102708w/

Djibouti
I was deployed to Camp Lemonier, Djibouti, for six months. During that time, our living units were about 50 yards from a burn pit. On the days after the nights when it was really bad, I couldn’t even taste the food I was eating, and I could still smell it —it was on my clothes and eventually saturated the walls and bed in my living quarters.
The report I was given when I left says there are no ill effects of exposure. It does outline what was burned, which was anything with the exception of ammunition and batteries.
A lot of us were waving the red flag while we were there, and nobody really seemed to care, nor do they now when I bring it up. I simply get the question, “Do you feel sick now?” Last I checked, long-term effects don’t appear a month after you get back.
Senior Airman Thomas McCaulla
Randolph Air Force Base, Texas
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2008/11/army_burnpit_letters_111708w/

This is a problem not only at Balad but also at Camp Al Taqaddum. During my tour there last year, I was a maintenance chief, and my Marines worked outside 24 hours a day. Most nights there would be soot or ash falling, and we would breathe this stuff in all night. I also recall many nights waking up in my little 6-by-8 plywood hooch thinking it was filled with smoke because the taste and the smell was so thick.
During the day, you could see usually two separate burns going at the same time with plumes of smoke so black we thought that an oil line was set ablaze. Many of us had the “crud” (hacking coughs, a lot of mucus) for most of the deployment, and like most, we had to suck it up and chalk it up to the environment we were in.
Marine Corps staff sergeant, name withheld
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2008/11/army_burnpit_letters_111708w/

While I was deployed to Camp Bucca, Iraq, in 2006 and 2007, I recall sitting in a tower or doing simple roving patrols around my compound and having to wear a mask to help with breathing. There would be a nasty haze floating over the camp; sometimes there were even reduced visibility warnings.
Senior Airman Veronica Nieto
Minot Air Force Base
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2008/11/army_burnpit_letters_111708w/

As you can see, the problems with burn pits is not just in Balad but other parts of Iraq and this practice is also being used in Afghanistan.
There are also reports that the jail Saddam was held in was built on a trash dumb. Every time something was done there, the smell was sickening.
This leads me to this warning. Make sure you keep track of everyone you were with and how to get a hold of them years from now. Don't let it turn into what Vietnam veterans faced after Agent Orange came into their lives years after they were in Vietnam.

The most perplexing part of all of this is what was done in Afghanistan in 2004. The following report was written in 2004 when the military was addressing the problems there. The question is, why is it still a problem in Iraq and why aren't the troops taken care of exposed to these dangers?

"One-stop" waste disposal—enhancing force protection in Afghanistan

Engineer: The Professional Bulletin for Army Engineers, Oct-Dec, 2004
By Lieutenant Colonel Garth Anderson and Lieutenant Colonel Whitney Wolf
Sound environmental practices in the theater of operations, principally hazardous and solid waste management, are truly an area of force protection. How much waste can a contingency base camp generate? Seemingly more than it can handle. By Spring 2002, units at Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan, were faced with a growing human health and environmental threat caused by huge amounts of waste that required collection, management, and disposal. This waste, not just from US forces, included vast amounts of destroyed equipment, trash, and hazardous waste left behind by Taliban forces that were routed away from the airfield.

Uncontrolled Waste Disposal


During the initial stages of base camp development, there were no easy disposal solutions. Most of the land in and around the airfield was potentially laden with mines and unexploded ordnance (UXO), which meant waste collection, consolidation, and disposal activities were limited to cleared locations close to soldier living and work areas within the camp. Off-site disposal was not an option since the local population was still unfriendly, and local disposal facilities did not exist. The first disposal area at the airfield consisted of a shallow trash burn pit surrounded by a large junkyard of old Soviet equipment, barrels of hazardous waste, discarded US materiel, trash, and small-caliber ammunition. This disposal site was uncontrolled, and many items--regardless of their potential hazard or reuse value--were thrown into or around the burn pit. The uncontrolled nature of the disposal area created a number of unacceptable conditions:
click link for more about what they did to address the problem.
COPYRIGHT 2004 U.S. Army Maneuver Support Center

While the Indiana National Guard has been reporting problems with their health, it appears this is a much larger problem that will have to be faced. Does the military plan on just waiting for the problems to be problems or will they finally address what they expose the troops to?

Terminal Burn Pit-Iraq Veteran Claim Denied by VA?

Report: VA Abandoned Terminally Ill Army Combat Veteran
Free Beacon 
BY: Morgan Chalfant 
February 24, 2016

Marshall missed mandatory meetings with the VA last year during which he would have had the opportunity to offer evidence connecting his cancer to his service in Iraq because he was hospitalized with pneumonia. While Marshall said he could still present such evidence, the VA will not listen to him.

A decorated Army combat veteran says that the Department of Veterans Affairs abandoned him in his fight against terminal cancer following his service in Iraq.

Pvt. John Marshall told Fox News that the VA has denied his claims that his service in Iraq, particularly his close proximity to burn pits, precipitated his cancer.

“It’s all just a big slap in the face. I tried to be the perfect soldier,” Marshall said. “I did everything I was told, and now they just forced my claim through and denied coverage and my benefits.”

Marshall, who now lives in a suburb of Phoenix, Arizona, was diagnosed with scar tissue sarcoma a little over a year ago. He attributes his illness to his time spent working over open burn pits, which a 2013 report from the Government Accountability Office designated as a likely cause of chronic health problems for veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.
read more here

Staff Sgt. Ryan Maseth May Get Justice After Electrocution Death

Mom of soldier electrocuted in base shower hails Supreme Court ruling 
The Associated Press
Published: January 21, 2015

PITTSBURGH — The mother of a Pittsburgh-area soldier electrocuted in his barracks shower at a U.S. Army base in Iraq seven years ago says she's grateful the Supreme Court rejected three appeals by a military contractor seeking to stop the case and other lawsuits from going forward.

The high court offered no comment Tuesday in allowing three lawsuits against KBR Inc. over the electrocution and open-air burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan to proceed.

The parents of Staff Sgt. Ryan Maseth, who was electrocuted in his barracks shower in January 2008, filed one of the lawsuits. The suit alleges a KBR unit was legally responsible for what it says was shoddy electrical work common in Iraqi-built structures taken over by the U.S. military. KBR disputes the claim.

Cheryl Harris, Maseth's mother, told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review on Wednesday that she never expected it to take more than seven years after her son's death to get the case closer to a trial. "I'm grateful that we're here," she said.
read more here

Green Beret electrocuted in shower on Iraq base
CNN
Abbie Boudreau and Scott Bronstein
May 28, 2008

Story Highlights
At least 12 U.S. troops have been electrocuted in Iraq from wiring problems

Ryan Maseth, 24, died January 2 while taking a shower on base

"I truly couldn't believe he would be electrocuted," his mom says

Defense Department inspector general, Congress launch investigation

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (CNN) -- A highly decorated Green Beret, Staff Sgt. Ryan Maseth died a painful death in Iraq this year. He died not on the battlefield. He died in what should have been one of the safest spots in Iraq: on a U.S. base, in his bathroom.

Ryan Maseth, a 24-year-old Green Beret, died in his shower January 2.

1 of 2 The water pump was not properly grounded, and when he turned on the shower, a jolt of electricity shot through his body and electrocuted him January 2.

The next day, Cheryl Harris was informed of his death. A mother of three sons serving in Iraq, she had feared such news might come one day.

"I did ask exactly, 'How did Ryan die? What happened to him?' And he had told me that Ryan was electrocuted," she said.

Her reaction was disbelief. "I truly couldn't believe he would be electrocuted ... in the shower," she said.

Maseth, 24, was not the first. At least 12 U.S. troops have been electrocuted in Iraq since the start of the war in 2003, according to military and government officials. Watch mom describe horror, heartbreak over son's electrocution »
read more here

Electrical Risks at Bases in Iraq Worse Than Previously Said
New York Times
By JAMES RISEN
Published: July 18, 2008

WASHINGTON — Shoddy electrical work by private contractors on United States military bases in Iraq is widespread and dangerous, causing more deaths and injuries from fires and shocks than the Pentagon has acknowledged, according to internal Army documents.

During just one six-month period — August 2006 through January 2007 — at least 283 electrical fires destroyed or damaged American military facilities in Iraq, including the military’s largest dining hall in the country, documents obtained by The New York Times show. Two soldiers died in an electrical fire at their base near Tikrit in 2006, the records note, while another was injured while jumping from a burning guard tower in May 2007.

And while the Pentagon has previously reported that 13 Americans have been electrocuted in Iraq, many more have been injured, some seriously, by shocks, according to the documents. A log compiled earlier this year at one building complex in Baghdad disclosed that soldiers complained of receiving electrical shocks in their living quarters on an almost daily basis.
read more here

6 soldiers sue KBR, Halliburton over burn pits

6 soldiers sue KBR, Halliburton over burn pits

The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Jun 4, 2009 18:37:26 EDT

SAN ANTONIO — Soldiers are among six Texans suing Houston-based KBR and Halliburton over burn pits at U.S. camps in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The suit filed in a San Antonio federal court alleges the military contractors burned everything from trucks and tires to human corpses in the large war-zone pits. Plantiffs say the burning waste released toxins that harmed at least 10,000 people.
go here for more
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/06/ap_army_burn_pits_060409/

Families link burn pits to health woes, debt

Families link burn pits to health woes, debt
By Patricia Kime - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Feb 6, 2012 13:36:19 EST
Army Reserve wife Rosie Torres, 38, stood in line Jan. 19 at a Texas Health and Human Services office to apply for assistance with her mortgage, bills and groceries.

Mounting debt related to her husband’s medical bills has pushed the couple into arrears; between insurance deductibles, house payments and overages, they owe more than $55,000.

LeRoy Torres, 39, a Reserve captain and former Texas state trooper, was assigned to Joint Base Balad, Iraq, in 2008 and believes exposure to the camp’s open-air burn pits left him with debilitating respiratory problems. He can’t walk long distances, perform daily tasks or even roughhouse with his kids.

But although he can’t work full time, between his drill pay and Rosie’s part-time pay, they make too much to qualify for a grant.

“My husband actually said that with our insurance, we’d be better off if he’s not around,” Rosie Torres said. “I don’t want to hear that. That’s not what our family needs.”
read more here

5 more burn-pit lawsuits filed against KBR

5 more burn-pit lawsuits filed against KBR

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Jun 16, 2009 17:12:49 EDT

Lawyers for veterans who believe they became sick after exposure to the smoke from open-air burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan have filed five more class-action lawsuits against KBR, the contractor that operated many of the burn-pit sites for the military.

The new lawsuits — filed in Florida, Kansas, Ohio, South Carolina and Utah federal courts — accuse KBR of exposing troops to toxins from giant burn pits used to dispose of garbage on bases. At Joint Base Balad, Iraq, 250 tons of garbage were burned every day at one point, including 90,000 plastic bottles each day. Troops have also documented the burning of petroleum products, amputated limbs of Iraqis, benzene and Styrofoam, as well as other materials known to produce cancer-causing toxins when burned.

The lawsuit in Florida includes the family of Air Force Maj. Kevin Wilkins, who died of brain cancer five days after a tumor was discovered. He had served at Balad, and when his doctor asked if he had been exposed to any toxins, Wilkins immediately suggested the burn pit.
go here for more
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/06/military_burnpit_lawsuits_061609w/

Military’s burn pit problems ignored by Congress

Veterans fear Congress has forgotten about the military’s burn pit problems
Military Times
By: Leo Shane III
5 hours ago

Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Nathanial Fink, left, and Lance Cpl. Garrett Camacho dispose of trash in a burn pit in the Khan Neshin district of Afghanistan in March 2012. (Cpl. Alfred V. Lopez/Marine Corps)

WASHINGTON — For years, Veterans Affairs leaders and administration officials have promised they won’t let health issues surrounding burn pit exposure in Iraq and Afghanistan become another “Agent Orange” in the community.

Now, advocates and a handful of lawmakers are worried it already has.

“The level of awareness among members of Congress on the problems from burn pits is abysmally low,” said Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii and an Army National Guard soldier who served in Iraq in 2004-2005. “Too few understand the urgency of the issue.”

Gabbard and Afghanistan war veteran Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., recently introduced new legislation dubbed the Burn Pits Accountability Act to require more in-depth monitoring of servicemembers’ health for signs of illnesses connected to toxic exposure in combat zones.
read more here

"For me, it was just about trying to turn the pain into purpose" after wife died serving near burn pits

Woodbury veteran's legacy lives on through Amie Muller Foundation

River Towns
Written By: Hannah Black
Jan 21st 2020

"For me, it was just about trying to turn the pain into purpose. When you think about ... what the military's done for us as a country, and then we're not taking care of our soldiers and our veterans the way we should, I think for us it's about raising awareness about how we can continue to help these veterans and to give back." Brian Muller

WOODBURY, Minn. — When Minnesota Air National Guard veteran and Woodbury resident Amie Muller died in 2017 after battling pancreatic cancer, her loved ones set out to carry on her legacy.

Amie Muller, 36, was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2016 and died nine months later. Muller, who served two tours in Iraq, believed her cancer was caused by living next to a massive burn pit while stationed in Balad. Courtesy of Brian Muller

The resulting Amie Muller Foundation was formed to provide financial assistance to military families fighting pancreatic cancer. The foundation will host its second annual Family Fun Day fundraiser Sunday, Jan. 26, at Nickelodeon Universe at the Mall of America in Bloomington. One of two yearly fundraisers the foundation holds, Family Fun Day was started as tribute to Muller's love of family and as a way to include the children — hers, and those of her family and friends — she loved so much.

"Amie was very family-focused, and her kids were everything to her," said Julie Tomaska, Muller's best friend and fellow Minnesota Air National Guard veteran. Muller and Tomaska were in the same unit and did two tours in Iraq together in 2005 and 2007.

Amie Muller and Tomaska had been stationed at Balad Air Base near a giant open-air burn pit. Inside the pit was anything from Styrofoam to plastics and even human body parts, burning 24 hours a day in a fire stoked by jet fuel, the Star Tribune reported in 2016. The burn pit was just one of many used by the U.S. military throughout Iraq and Afghanistan.

Tomaska and Muller's husband, Brian, started planning the foundation shortly after Amie's death. Every couple of months, the foundation's leadership combs through the GoFundMe site in search of military families affected by a pancreatic cancer diagnosis, providing $2,500 to $5,000 in financial aid to each family.

Nearly 200,000 veterans have signed up for the VA's Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry. read it here

VA, DoD seek better data on burn-pit exposure

VA, DoD seek better data on burn-pit exposure

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Feb 24, 2010 9:43:08 EST

As Veterans Affairs Department officials laid out a plan for the Institute of Medicine to look for links between certain symptoms and burn-pit exposure, they also quizzed Defense Department scientists about what they’ve already done in that regard.

“We have a particular need to solve this as best as we can,” said Victoria Cassano, acting director of VA’s Environmental Agents Service. “You tell us what the science is. You tell us what the evidence is. Do we have enough to [move] forward with a presumption or not?”

At the first meeting of the IOM’s Committee on the Long-Term Health Consequences of Exposure to Burn Pits in Iraq and Afghanistan, Cassano asked the panel to help VA determine if the symptoms of several sick service members could be linked to exposure to smoke from open-air burn pits in the war zones.

If so, Congress could create a law saying veterans potentially connected could automatically receive a “presumption of service connection” for those ailments, similar to a law that assumes service connection for Vietnam Veterans whose diseases could have come from exposure to the defoliant Agent Orange in Vietnam.
read more here
VA, DoD seek better data on burn pit exposure

Ailing vets sue over burn pits

Ailing vets sue over smoke from trash fires in Iraq, Afghanistan
'You'd cough up black stuff, and you couldn't seem to catch your breath'
msnbc.com
updated 8/6/2010 5:22:20 AM ET

Some 241 military personnel and contractors who became ill after serving in Afghanistan and Iraq are suing a Houston-based firm, claiming they were poisoned by smoke from trash fires, the Washington Post reported Friday.

The claimants, who are from 42 states, are suffering from a range of conditions including cancer and severe breathing problems, which they blame on the thick, black smoke. The symptoms were reportedly nicknamed "Iraqi crud" by troops.

They are taking legal action against Kellogg Brown & Root, which operated more than two dozen burn-pits in the two countries, the Post reported. It used to be a subsidiary of Halliburton, which is a also a defendant in the case.

These were used to get rid of garbage including plastic water bottles, Styrofoam food containers, mangled bits of metal, paint, solvent, medical waste and dead animals by dousing it in fuel and setting fire to it, the newspaper said.
read more here
Ailing vets sue over smoke from trash fires
linked from
http://icasualties.org/Iraq/index.aspx

Combat Did Not Kill Iraq Veteran But Burn Pits May

Cancer forces veteran to fight for his life
Daily Times
Hannah Grover
April 16, 2016

Retired New Mexico National Guard Master Sgt. David Montoya hopes a clinical trial in Texas can help save his life

"I knew it was the burn pits," he said. Montoya is among dozens of veterans throughout the country who have sued Halliburton and KBR Inc., companies that were contracted by the military to dispose of waste in Iraq and Afghanistan.

FARMINGTON — After two combat tours in Iraq, a local veteran is now fighting a battle against cancer.

David Montoya, a retired master sergeant with the New Mexico Army National Guard, is battling lung cancer. He talks about the experience on Thursday at the home of his girlfriend, Summer Martinez. (Photo: Steve Lewis/The Daily Times)

And his friends and family are trying to raise the money necessary to help David Montoya, a retired master sergeant with the New Mexico National Guard, receive treatment in Houston.

Montoya, 44, was diagnosed with colorectal cancer in 2012 while serving at the National Guard Armory in Farmington.

"It happened so fast I had to have emergency surgery," Montoya recalled last week.

He said the tumor in his colon nearly caused the organ to burst. At the time, his prognosis was good. Doctors removed the tumor, and chemotherapy destroyed cancerous cells in his lymph nodes.

But at a cancer screening in February 2014, Montoya learned that the cancer was back, and, this time, it was in his lungs.
read more here

VA Open Air Burn Pit Registry Late

Senators Press VA to Explain Delay in Burn Pit Registry
NBC News
BY BILL BRIGGS
March 18, 2014

Two U.S. senators insisted Tuesday that Veterans Affairs Secretary Erik Shinseki reveal why his agency is nearly three months late in creating a legally-mandated registry of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans potentially poisoned — some lethally — by exposure to toxic trash-fire trenches.

The so-called "burn pits," scattered throughout Iraq and Afghanistan, spewed acrid smoke while breaking down damaged Humvees, ordnance, mattresses, rocket launchers, and even amputated body parts. Some were ignited by jet fuel.

Perhaps the largest such dump was in Balad, Iraq, spanning the length of 10 football fields. The plumes produced have been dubbed "this generation's Agent Orange."

On Jan. 10, 2013, President Barack Obama signed a law giving the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs one year to create and maintain the Open Air Burn Pit Registry, meant to identify and monitor veterans who inhaled the pollutants. The VA also was directed to later report its findings to Congress.
read more here

Congress Dumps Veterans in Burn Pits

Congress Drops Burn Pit Exposure from Pentagon Research List
Military.com
Bryant Jordan
December 23, 2015

Senior Airman Frances Gavalis tosses unserviceable uniform items into a burn pit at Balad Air Base, Iraq, on March 10, 2008. Julianne Showalter/Air Force

Burn pit exposure as a cause of illnesses among veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan failed to make the 2016 list of peer-reviewed medical research programs that Congress requires the Defense Department to conduct.

The absence of burn pit exposure on the list was confirmed on Tuesday by a spokeswoman for the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs at Fort Detrick, Maryland.

"Congress designates the topic areas for each fiscal year, and these topic areas change each year," Gail Whitehead told Military.com.

The research programs fall under the Department of Defense budget.

"There's nothing comparable," said Anthony Hardie, director of Veterans for Common Sense. "There's very little research inside the [Department of Veterans Affairs]."

Ron Brown, president of the National Gulf War Research Center, which has long advocated for more medical research into Gulf War Illness and now burn pit exposure, said he didn't know why the topic was discontinued.

It was added for the first time to the list in 2015, according to Brown, who took part in the peer reviewed process this year.
read more here

Beau Biden's Death May Save Lives After Burn Pit Exposures

Link Found Between Burn Pits and Cancers MSN

Joe Biden's eldest son Beau Biden returned home from his deployment to Iraq after serving two years in the U.S. military's occupation of the country. In a few months' time following his return, he began to experience an onset of illnesses, including a stroke that lead to brain cancer, which killed him in less than two years from that point. Beau Biden's case is not unlike many other veterans who have served overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan, as a recent study has linked service in those countries to various cancers and bronchial illnesses. The common trait between the two is believed to lie within the open air burn pits, of which their are over 250 between the two countries, set up atop Saddam Hussein's chemical weapons program.

Burn-pit registry for veterans signed into law

Burn-pit registry for veterans signed into law
Army Times
By Patricia Kime
Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Jan 10, 2013

President Obama signed legislation Thursday requiring the Veterans Affairs Department to establish a registry for troops and veterans who lived and worked near open-air burn pits used to dispose waste in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere overseas.

In addition to including new requirements for providing a casket or urn for veterans with no known next of kin and establishing care for a military cemetery in the Philippines, the Dignified Burial and Other Veterans Benefits Improvement Act, S. 3202, aims to pinpoint the number of veterans who may have been exposed to burn-pit smoke so VA can track their medical histories and keep them apprised of new treatments for associated conditions.

Troops deployed in support of contingency operations and stationed at a location where an open burn pit was used will be eligible to register.

Veterans advocacy groups and families of service members who have become ill since their deployments hailed passage of the law as a “victory.”
read more here
Also
Obama signs Katie's Law, burn pit registry bills

US military faulted for burn-pit use

US military faulted for burn-pit use
By Ernesto Londoño
The Washington Post
Published: April 25, 2013

The U.S. military spent $5 million on incinerators at a base in Afghanistan that never became operable, forcing troops to use a type of open-air burn pit that has been linked to serious respiratory problems among veterans, according to a government report.

The Pentagon banned burn pits at large war-zone bases after facing a flurry of lawsuits and health claims by Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who were exposed to toxic fumes during deployments. The pits are used to burn everything from cafeteria waste to feces.

The case of the inoperable incinerators at Forward Operating Base Salerno in eastern Afghanistan, detailed in a new inspector general report, sheds light on the continued challenges of waste disposal in combat zones and the stark choices that commanders in Afghanistan are having to make as the U.S. military footprint continues to contract.
read more here

Nine burn-pit lawsuits filed against KBR

Nine burn-pit lawsuits filed against KBR

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Apr 28, 2009 17:25:00 EDT

Lawyers filed seven class-action lawsuits in seven states on behalf of service members and civilians who say they were sickened by the open-air burn pits on U.S. military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The lawsuits, including a wrongful death suit, were filed against contractor KBR Inc., as well as its parent company, Halliburton, after a Military Times story that ran last October showed that the burn pit at Joint Base Balad, the biggest U.S. base in Iraq, burned everything from petroleum products to dioxin-releasing plastic water bottles to amputated limbs.

Two more lawsuits are expected to be filed Wednesday
go here for more
Nine burn-pit lawsuits filed against KBR/

Call Congress Today - Our Veterans Need Treatment

You've read the reports on burn pits on this blog since they were first reported. You know how serious this is. You've read about Gulf War veterans suffering and waiting for help. If you didn't care about these issues, didn't care about our veterans, you wouldn't be reading this blog. Since you care so much, please do what you can to help by making the calls to help our veterans.

Call Congress Today - Our Veterans Need Treatment !

Issue: Call Congress and voice your support for full funding for the Gulf War illness research program of the Department of Defense. The military program is called the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program, or CDMRP. Veterans for Common Sense urges funding at the full $25 million level.

Background: Earlier this year, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) recognized the chronic multisymptom illness suffered by 250,000 Gulf War veterans due are to toxic exposures during Desert Shield and Desert Storm. The Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illness (RAC) reached the same scientific conclusion in 2008. The IOM and RAC support research programs to develop treatments and hopefully preventions for both our veterans and our troops deployed overseas now.

Why is this important? Many of these toxic exposures exist today. By calling both the Washington and local offices of the senior Democratic and Republican members of the Appropriations Subcommittee deciding CPMR funding, you let them know that this illness is a huge problem suffered by real people who served our country.

You've heard of the Iraq War Burn Pits? We can't let another generation of veterans wait a decade for medical care. Tell Congress to do the right thing for our veterans so we can have medical treatments for toxic exposures.

Who do I call? Please call two important Congressmen who will decide if Gulf War, Afghanistan War, and Iraq War veterans get the research and treatment they urgently need.

1. Chairman Norm Dicks, Washington, DC 202-225-5916; Tacoma, WA 253-593-6536.

2. Congressman Bill Young, ranking member, Washington 202-225-5961; St. Petersburg, FL 727-893-3191.

Thank you for calling today !

Veterans For Common Sense