A Night Spent Typing - getting help from Scientists, Media & Government

18 May: Thanks to our county's safety office, I got a long list of agencies and schools concerned with workplace safety, Agent Orange, toxicity, prostate cancer and other topics. I got up something of a form letter and started emailing it to everyone I could located with an email address on their various web sites, in particular state agencies, state departments of veterans affairs, and the Oregon Health Sciences University, which here in Portland has a particular interest group looking at Agent Orange.
Samples of what I wrote are attached and I suggest you use these, or word them yourselves to have them more effective, and email or mail them to your state authorities and others who can look at this issue of aircrew exposure to Agent Orange.
Our objective is clear: locate and convince authoritative sources to take these Air Force reports, plus our own unscientific anecdotal information, and help the VA reach the conclusion that flying Agent Orange contaminated aircraft equals Agent Orange exposure for the purpose of service-connection for Agent Orange-presumed conditions.

I've put a bunch of the letters I wrote in a single PDF file under the links section. Glad to have you folks do your own letters and copy me for inclusion. Know any neighborhood scientists or toxic exposure experts to help us??
Also located a current study about Agent Orange and kidney cancer, click here to download.

May 14-15: C-123K documents gathered, VA benefits explained

Lots of time on the Internet. How did folks ever put one and one together to make a case about something before the Internet came along? I found one of my father-in-law's concept papers which he wrote while with Rand Corporation...published back in the '60s and still online! 
Anyway, lots of time writing veterans' organizations, with specific appeals to noted military writers and the Air Force Times to try to get some traction on this issue of C-123K contamination. 
No FOIAs in yet, with the first expected June 10 or so. Some very kind advice from very skillful FOIA officers in many instances...our thanks! 
Today I posted the 21MB  complete presentation of our Agent Orange-C-123K argument, suitable for reprinting with a cover, title page, concept, supporting documentation (what we have thus far, absent the FOIA results), and back cover. What we also need is professional guidance...somebody to smack some science into this, taking the various source documents like the site surveys and the flight records, and building a case for certain exposure to Agent Orange. 
We also don't have a word from any of our maintenance guys! John Harris knows some of them, and we need the word put out to those units which were at Rickenbacker and Pittsburgh. 
I'm "fortunate" in having a 100% VA disability rating and Air Force retirement as well, but we all know that most of the folks we flew with aren't that blessed. Lots have their AF retirement and some a VA disability, but more  deserve it. What are the advantages of having BOTH?

Example of a Positive VA Award - Agent Orange Exposure outside Vietman

This positive finding is important: it established Agent Orange for a veteran able to prove he was exposed to Agent Orange outside Vietnam, claiming it was sprayed around the base area. We should be able to use a similar argument before the VA!
-------- Citation NR: 9800877-------

Decision Date: 01/13/98 Archive Date: 01/21/98  DOCKET NO.  97-05 078

On appeal from the Department of Veterans Affairs Regional Office San Diego, CA

ISSUE: Service connection for prostate cancer due to Agent Orange exposure.

WITNESS AT HEARING ON APPEAL: Appellant

ATTORNEY FOR THE BOARD, Alice A. Booher, Counsel

INTRODUCTION: The veteran had active service from July 1960 to October 

1963. This appeal to the Board of Veterans' Appeals (the Board) is 

from rating action by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) 

Regional Office (RO) in Salt Lake City.  

Important Agent Orange & Veterans Issues Links

IMPORTANT LINKS		Click on any to access!
COPIES OF RELATED REPORTS, STUDIES: Agent Orange Training for the VA Board of Appeals VBA21 -4138: Statement in Support of Claim: a statement from a fellow veterans who saw you in some activity, observed your accident, illness or knows of typical situations. Your doctor's letter (remind them to make positive statements, not "may have" or other inconclusive & vague stuff), your wife, anyone who can add info. Professional opinions must be phrased "his condition is as likely to as not be caused by" etc. as the weakest wording, and "with medical certainty"-type language if possible. Veterans & Agent Orange Update, Institute of Medicine (2008, over 800 pages)

Getting the word out!

Late last week and this weekend we've had several former members of the 74AES as well as LtCol John Harris active in contacting veterans' organizations, news outlets, reporters specializing in military issues, newspapers in the Springfield MA and New Hampshire area, as well as a couple law firms. One firm specializes in veterans issues which are before the Board of Veterans Appeals, and one specializes in Agent Orange issues and thus far has been very successful.

Personal: Today I learned my great brother-in-law, Sergeant First Class Willie Chiquina USA Ret, passed away with complications from Alzheimer's. Born and raised on Guam, and stationed there for some years later, Willy and my sister lost their first child while being medevac'd from Berlin to Landstuhl...the child died of neurological issues the parents always thought were associated with Agent Orange. In 1983 I had the honor of doing his last reenlistment before his retirement.

Buck Passing - what a surprise (not!)

Amazing how government agencies so often refer you to other agencies, which either can't help you or refer you to yet another agency.


Gathering a complete collection of our documents showing the contamination of the C-123K as well as our flight orders and other papers placing us on duty aboard that toxic airplane, I asked several agencies to review our case. I asked that if their study of the papers would lead them to conclude that we'd been exposed to Agent Orange contaminants, to please write a letter saying so as that would be helpful to put our case before the VA, Universally, these agencies didn't refuse directly, but explained that all such responses must come from the VA,