Letter to BVA Attorney Who Opposed Aaron Olmsted's VA Claims

Submitted today to Mr. Stephen Reiss, attorney with the Board of Veterans Appeals through the Veterans Law Review, the only email address I could find for him:

Mr. Stephen D. Reiss, Esq.
Executive Editor, Veterans Law Review
Room 841 (mail code 01A), Lafayette Bldg.
810 Vermont Ave., N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20420

Reference: Docket 06-42 315, C28 107-548

Dear Mister Reiss,

On 23 August 2007 you successfully represented the Board of Veterans’ Appeals in this case, with Judge Cohn denying the veteran’s appeal. Olmstead had claimed Agent Orange exposure while flying Air Force Reserve C-123K aircraft post-Vietnam, aircraft commonly used during that war for spraying Agent Orange.

In particular, Judge Cohn cited:

“While these planes may be of the type that were used in Vietnam to dispense Agent Orange from 1962 to 1971, there is no evidence that any of the planes on which the veteran flew dispensed Agent Orange in Vietnam or that there was any residual Agent Orange on the aircraft the veteran served on. Further, the veteran has not submitted any evidence that any of the planes on which the veteran served on. Further, the veteran has not submitted any evidence substantiating his contention that there was any residual Agent Orange material on the aircraft he served on. His assertion, standing alone, is not sufficient to show he had actual exposure to Agent Orange, years after it was used in Vietnam.”

I had a heart attack, cancer and heart surgery in April and thus had the time to look into these illnesses and what may have led them to my doorstep. I wondered about the planes which, like Olmsted (whom I don’t believe I ever met), I flew between 1972-1982. It took all of five minutes or so with Google to learn that most of these planes were indeed used for spraying Agent Orange, that in particular, Tail Number 362 (Patches) was used for Agent Orange and was tested repeatedly beginning in 1997 with positive results for presence of dioxin. Just ten minutes with Google provided everything I was concerned with, and FOIAs offered yet more interesting materials.

I learned that the Air Force (in the person first of Major Urlula Moul of the Air Force Office of Environmental Law) recommended keeping this type information “within official channels only.” Further, reports and correspondence regarding these tests and others were surfaced at the Office of the Air Force Surgeon, at Headquarters Air Force Material Command and at the Office of Secretary of Defense.

Mine is the profession of arms, not of law…your rules are confusing and perhaps meant to be so. However, I’m sure I may assume that had you known of the attached documents, you would not have presented to Judge Cohn that Olmsted wasn’t eligible for to service connection because the very documents he needed to have justice before the BVA were being withheld from him by the government.

Judge Cohn’s reasons cited for denial were easily able to be answered with documents withheld by the government, whatever may be the reasons individuals in those government offices had for their actions. No national security was involved at that or any other time regarding this issue. 

Bad acts and hiding evidence of harmful toxin exposure “within official channels” is certainly an effective way to prevent veteran’s Agent Orange claims, but cannot be an ethical, moral or legal justification for denying veteran Olmsted a just hearing from Judge Cohn and an effective and honorable presentation by you yourself. The Judge may have found against Olmsted but it certainly wouldn’t have been for the reasons cited.

(personal portion removed)

May I trust that it continues to be of interest to you, and to the Board of Veterans Appeals, that veterans such as Aaron Olmsted benefit from your commitment to accuracy and truth in all presentations before the BVA, and that if facts such as these are withheld from you by other government agencies, you will make right those wrongs dealt him, Olmsted’s survivors and C-123K/UC-123K veterans who find themselves similarly situated before the BVA?

Sir, help make this wrong right.

Respectfully,

Wesley T. Carter, Major, USAF Retired
Medical Service Corps

Open Letter - Request for Help from Institute of Medicine Agent Orange Committee

To the Members of the Institute of Medicine, National Academy of Sciences,

To: Doctor Richard Fenske, Chair and (in turn) Dr Erin Bell, Dr Scott Burchiel, Dr Janice Chambers, Dr Naihua Duan, Dr Peter Gann, Dr Mark Goldberg, Dr Nancy Kerkvliet, Dr Stephen Kritchevsky, Dr Michele Marcus, Dr Linda McCauley, Dr Alvaro Puga, Dr Jeremy Shefner and Dr Hollie Swanson

Dear Members of the Committee,

On behalf of Colonel Arch Battesta, Colonel Ken Wheeler, Colonel Joseph Curley, Lieutenant Colonel Paul Bailey, Lieutenant Colonel Bob Karpinski, Lieutenant Colonel John Harris, Chief Master Sergeant Charles Fusco, Major Al Harrington, Major Gale Harrington, Brigadier General Mike Walker, Major Stephen Clancey, Master Sergeant Steve Caraker, Master Sergeant George Gadbois, the late Master Sergeant Bob Boyd, Colonel Dee Holiday, Lieutenant Colonel Gail Sorenson and her late husband Lieutenant Colonel Art Sorenson, Lieutenant Colonel Ed Kosakoski, our families and an estimated 500 others similarly situated,

We seek the emergency assistance from the Committee in the form of your recommendation to the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense that the dioxin-contaminated aircraft we flew be designated Agent Orange-contaminated sites. Each of the aircraft we seek to have so designated can be identified by historical records, contamination surveys and physical presence of Agent Orange spray apparatus. Agent Orange toxins remained in each of these aircraft until they were destroyed in 2010.

In 1972 the Air Force Reserve began flying the C-123K/UC-123K “Provider” aircraft previously used for Agent Orange spray missions in Vietnam. Dioxin contamination persisted on these aircraft, at least eleven of which were assigned to the squadrons we flew with. Numerous tests by the Air Force in 1993 and later established the harmful levels of dioxin contamination remaining on the surplus aircraft, all then retired after ten years of our use flying missions worldwide. Military concern about the established contamination led the decontamination by destruction of the remaining aircraft by melting them into scrap metal ingots. Air Force and GSA testimony before a federal judge on a 2000 private lawsuit had the aircraft described as “extremely hazardous”, “extremely contaminated” and “extremely dangerous.”

Veterans who flew the Provider during the years we did not suspect its contamination later turned to the Department of the Air Force to help identify the aircrews and maintenance personnel so they could be notified of their likely exposure to dioxin, but the Air Force responded they lacked the ability to identify the personnel involved. Earlier, for some reason, The Air Force Judge Advocate General responsible for the Office of Environmental Law (and her supervisor) recommended restricting information about the aircraft contamination to "within official channels," perhaps appropriately concerned with the reaction of exposed aircrews. 

Speaking personally, this writer would have been concerned, but if I'd been alerted in 1996 when this JAG officer's recommendation was made, I would perhaps have better responded before my cancer, heart attack, heart surgery, diabetes and peripheral neuropathy surfaced in a two month period sixteen years later. I had surgeries for acute peripheral neuropathy, an Agent Orange-presumptive illness, in 1975 and 1976, following my assignment to fly the C-123K.UC-123K starting in 1974. Certainly, what health precautions I would have taken should have been my decision to make, not her decision to keep me from knowing about.

Our group of veterans submitted the several Air Force test results to the Oregon Health Sciences University with the question…"does the dioxin contamination shown on the aircraft tests equate to exposure to dioxin by the aircrews and maintenance workers assigned to those aircraft between 1972-1982?"  The OSHU responded “Most Likely”.

Anecdotal sworn testimony from experienced maintenance workers in the 901st OMS establishes the intense effort after Vietnam to scrape the remaining Agent Orange residue from the aircraft, especially the sub-belly and wing interior sections, with DOD advice being that the residue was harmless and remove the residue and reduce the foul odors to scrape the residue with putty knives, then wash with Dawn dish soap and rinse thoroughly. Yet still, twenty and thirty years after the last Agent Orange spray missions, the aircraft tested in the Air Force words “extremely hazardous”, "extremely dangerous" and "heavily contaminated."

We earnestly seek the Committee’s immediate help. There is no controversy regarding the Air Force’s own tests establishing the presence of harmful levels of contaminants on our airplanes, and there is no controversy regarding eleven of our squadron’s 26 aircraft having been used for Agent Orange spray missions. The OSHU concludes that our exposure while flying and maintaining these toxic aircraft was “most likely” to have occurred. There is no hypothetical situation here...no question about whether we could have been exposed hundreds of miles out at sea or thousands of feet aloft...we point to the multitude of Air Force tests which establish our intense and intimate contact with this contaminated airplane, to the OSHU study, to your own common sense.

We don’t know your procedures or guidelines, but as a small group of veterans with a non-controversial argument for having been exposed to dioxin, we seek your help in whatever manner appropriate, so long as it is soon enough to help our sick veterans seek care through the Department of Veterans Affairs. If you have a different procedure to seek your help, tell me how to proceed. If you are organizationally restricted from what we request, what other help can you give us? 

Hopefuly and Respectfully,

For the C-123K/UC-123K Veterans of 1972-1982

Wesley T. Carter, Major, USAF Retired

 www.c123kcancer.blogspot.com
email: rustsilverwings@gmail.com

Agent Orange Contaminated Aircraft Sold to Foreign Governments

Air Force records prepared by AFMC at Davis-Monthan AFB in 1996 indicate at least eight of the C-123K aircraft sold or otherwise provided to foreign governments are "suspected of Dioxin Contamination". Often as aircraft age and the United States retires them, other friendly countries purchase the planes or the US provides them as military support.


Foreign sales or transfers are managed out of Wright-Patterson AFB by the Air Force Security Assistance Center. I've requested information about whether these governments have been told about the "suspected dioxin contamination" but have not yet received an answer from AFSAC. Air Force records also indicate that the Air Force Environmental Law Division (Major Ursula Moul) in Oct 1996 recommended keeping such information within "official channels", so it may be that no notice was ever provided foreign users. In one memo she said she'd be doing something about notifying the buyers...but that notification is very hard to find...we're still looking, and so is the Air Force. Must be somewhere. She wouldn't overlook a safety issue like that, right?


Leaves us with an understanding that no alert was ever provided the US aircrews whose duty it was to fly these same contaminated aircraft between 1972-1982 before the planes were distributed.