Soldiers training at Fort Ord, California. (Photo: Maj. Ken Koop)
A Feb. 23 report published by the Associated Press asks whether soldiers and family members stationed at the now-defunct Fort Ord U.S. Army base near Salinas, California were exposed to toxic chemicals, possibly leading to serious medical conditions such as cancer decades later.
Fort Ord was decommissioned in 1994; however, hundreds of thousands of soldiers had visited or lived at the base since the base’s establishment in 1917. According to an ongoing Environmental Protection Agency investigation, the ex-base has been home to leaking petroleum tanks, residential and commercial landfills, runoff from motor pools, as well as training grounds for fire drills, small arms fire, and explosive ordinance, all of which contain chemicals that the AP and EPA claim has impacted the base’s water supply.
Moreover, the U.S. Army was found to have improperly dumped contaminated waste such as toxic paints and other solvents in residential landfills, a practice that is outlawed in most civilian landfills.
To date, the EPA says hazardous chemicals can still be found onsite while the U.S. Army operates a cleanup operation under EPA supervision. Despite this, the AP says the Department of Defense, “some in the Department of Veterans Affairs,” and local utility companies still contend that the drinking water at Ford Ord “is safe and always has been.”
Currently, there is no available data on whether servicemembers, veterans, or their families have ailments, serious or otherwise, that can be linked to Fort Ord. However, the AP says “in the region that includes Fort Ord, veterans have a 35 percent higher rate of multiple myeloma diagnosis than the general U.S. population.”
Readers can view the AP’s full story here.
Author: Christian Southards
Coming from a family with a proud military background and wanting to contribute his writing skills to a worthy cause, Christian began writing for the California American Legion in August of 2020. His father is a 25-year Army Veteran and his grandfather served in the Navy during Vietnam.