Depot incident still lingers

This story was published Sun, Mar 18, 2001

By Mary Hopkin
Herald Oregon bureau

HERMISTON - Brian Zasso and Tony Kimball were hedging their bets. The union pipefitters, both of Kennewick, were working at Hanford in fall 1999, when they decided to sign on to help build the giant incinerator at the Umatilla Chemical Depot.

The new job offered an opportunity of steady work near their hometown, something neither of the seasoned craftsmen could pass up.

Jim Shaffer's goal was different. He was making the trip from Kennewick to put in the last 1,500 hours needed to qualify for his union pension.

But there's no sure thing, and now, 18 months after an unexplained on-the-job exposure to a still-unknown substance, the three men are wishing they had stayed in the Tri-Cities.

If they had, Zasso, Kimball and Shaffer say they'd still be able to walk outside and enjoy fresh air, without coughing and losing their breath.

They say they wouldn't be tired all the time.

And they say they wouldn't be saddled with financial burdens, wondering how they're going to take care of themselves and their families.

They'd still be able to bring home a paycheck.

Lawsuits follow illnesses

Zasso, Kimball and Shaffer are three of 34 construction workers who were mysteriously stricken on Sept. 15, 1999, while helping build an incinerator plant that will be used to destroy 7.4 million pounds of deadly nerve and mustard agents stored at the depot.

They also are among 18 workers who are suing Raytheon Demilitarization Co. and the Army for allegedly exposing them to toxic nerve and mustard agents the day they fell ill.

No one denies the workers were affected by something, but state and federal officials say it wasn't the nerve agents sarin or VX, or the blister agent mustard, all of which were stored a few hundred yards from the construction site.

The Army, Raytheon and Oregon's Department of Environmental Quality completed independent tests within the building and of the workers' clothes, and although none of the studies have pinpointed a cause, they all have ruled out chemical weapons as the culprit.

Kimball was working on the first floor of the munitions and demilitarization building at about 11 a.m. that morning, when he suddenly couldn't breathe.

"I started gagging and choking," Kimball said. "I couldn't get any air in my lungs. My gut hurt and the inside of my mouth had a bittersweet taste."

Zasso, Kimball's partner, was quick to help, although he was having difficulty breathing himself, he said.

"I pulled Tony out and fell through the door onto the ground," Zasso said. "It was like I was on fire - my skin tingled ,and I had acidic bile in my mouth."

The two made their way to the first aid trailer, which sits halfway between the munitions and demilitarization building and K-block.

K-block is the heavily guarded and barbed-wired section of the depot where all the bombs and rockets, filled with deadly nerve agents such as sarin and VX, are stacked on wooden pallets inside thick concrete and earthen bunkers.

The mustard gas is tightly sealed in heavy steel containers that look like thick, round bank vaults. The beige metal building that houses the gas is within sight of the first aid trailer where Zasso and Kimball sought help.

Medical treatment questioned

Officials acknowledge that when many of the ill workers first arrived at the trailer, the two paramedics on staff weren't there.

But that's because the paramedics had taken the ambulance down to the building to see if they could find any of the sick workers, said Dale Ternes, one of the emergency medical technicians on duty that day.

"The initial report came that there were people coming out of the building sick, and we went down there, but didn't find anyone who appeared to be ill," Ternes said.

When Ternes and the other paramedic, Glen Phillips, returned to the trailer, the scene had changed.

"There were a lot of people walking around, but it was difficult to differentiate between who was ill and who wasn't," Ternes said. He began assessing the situation, determining who was in need of immediate attention and whose symptoms weren't as severe.

"My first instinct was that this was an industrial accident," said Ternes, who has 17 years of experience as an EMT and has received special training through the Hermiston Fire Department and Raytheon to recognize the symptoms of nerve agent exposure.

"I in no way considered this a chemical event," Ternes said. "There was nothing pointing in that direction."

Still, something was clearly wrong. One patient was taken by ambulance to the hospital while Ternes stayed behind with Heather Madison, another EMT who had come over from Raytheon's training department to help administer oxygen and take vital signs.

Since the trailer was small, most of the affected workers, including Zasso, Kimball and Shaffer, couldn't get inside.

"We sat outside while they took one person in the ambulance," Shaffer said. "I was coughing, convulsing and had a headache. They didn't call the hospital, the fire department or notify the military. They broke all their own procedures."

Shaffer, Zasso and Kimball all were taken to Good Shepherd Hospital in Hermiston about an hour and 20 minutes after the incident occurred, according to Raytheon records.

Shaffer and Zasso were given oxygen, examined and sent home. Kimball was kept overnight for observation.

But none of the workers was treated for chemical exposure at the hospital, said Ken Franz, the emergency room nurse manager for Good Shepherd.

In their lawsuit, the workers claim they didn't receive adequate care and are suffering long-term effects from being exposed to chemical agents that day.

Effects remain far-reaching

Kimball complains of a nearly constant cough and diminished lung capacity that dropped from 97 percent before the incident to 60 percent after that day.

He doesn't have the energy he used to. It's been replaced by nightmares and cold sweats.

"I'm being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder," Kimball said. "I haven't worked since."

Shaffer is back at work training for a new job, but he wonders about his future.

"I still have headaches, and I have to use a nebulizing machine with a saline solution every morning to help me breathe," Shaffer said. "I'm a walking medicine cabinet - I have sleeping pills and anxiety pills. And I can't concentrate. So, since I can't perform well, I probably will be terminated."

That's the toughest pill to swallow for Shaffer. The loss of his job forced him to sell his house and move into an apartment, he said.

He worries about the effect on his family. "I can't provide for myself, not to mention my family," he said. "I have twin boys graduating in June, and I can't help them go to college."

Zasso said his daughters, Shannon, 23, and Erin, 18, have been his salvation, and he doesn't know how he'll repay them.

"I didn't think I would live for the first month," Zasso said. "My kids have taken care of me. I'm $30,000 in debt and barely surviving."

Zasso's workers compensation benefits were cut off in November, although Kimball, who claims the same injuries stemming from the same accident, still is receiving payments from the state.

Zasso has appealed, but the hearing scheduled for March 14 before a state labor judge has been postponed until September.

"I don't know what I'm going to do," Zasso said.

Officials dispute allegations

Despite the lingering effects, the Army and others maintain that the workers are wrong about the source of their miseries.

The symptoms of nerve agent exposure - the pinpoint eyes and running noses - weren't there on the day of the incident, said Ternes, the paramedic.

And mustard, the blister agent, wasn't even a consideration. "It takes a long time to see the effects of mustard," Ternes said. "It's not instantaneous. It's not supposed to be."

Rather, mustard is designed to sneak up on the enemy, said Lt. Col. Tom Woloszyn, depot commander.

In war, the odorless agent was sprayed on fields and the soldiers who walked through and picked up the mustard on their boots and pants, wouldn't realize they'd been exposed for nearly 12 hours.

All 34 affected workers were on the bottom floor of the building, in an area about 100 feet by 100 feet. It doesn't make sense that a chemical agent would hit them under those circumstances, officials said.

If it had, a lot more of the 1,300 workers on site that day would have been hit, too, Woloszyn said. "Chemical agents don't skip over areas, and they don't pick and choose their victims," he said.

Ternes, who still works part time at the site, is convinced that whatever affected the workers did not come from K-block.

"The first aid trailer sits halfway between K-block and the building," Ternes said. "Our doors were open. There's no way that we wouldn't have been hit."

Depot monitoring detected trace amounts of nerve agent in the air, but that's not unusual.

Last summer, air monitors at the depot showed traces of sarin and chemical agents on nearly 60occasions.

But Woloszyn and Wayne Thomas of the Department of Environmental Quality said the amounts found are below levels that monitoring equipment can accurately measure and are far too low to threaten human health.

Additional monitoring was conducted immediately after the incident and the following day, according to Raytheon records.

The Army is convinced the tests would have found any nerve or chemical agents in the area.

"The first thing they did was seal the building," Woloszyn explained. "It doesn't degrade. In a closed area, we would have still been able to detect it."

Not all experts agree

But Dr. Drew Brodkin, associate professor of internal medicine and environmental health at the University of Washington, has evaluated many of the workers and says their symptoms suggest chemical exposure.

Brodkin has conducted physical and neurological tests on many of the victims.

"There is a consistent pattern reported by workers of very severe respiratory symptoms and neurological effects," Brodkin said.

Brodkin stopped short of naming an exact cause of his patients' ailments, but said chemical nerve agents are suspect.

"We have to review all potential chemical exposures before coming to a firm conclusion of an exact cause," Brodkin said.

The injured workers aren't looking for a cause as much as a cure.

Shaffer says the Army and Raytheon have lied and covered up the cause of his injuries.

And for that, he says, they should pay.

"I'm too old to get another job, too young to retire, and I'm not dead yet," Shaffer said. "So, what do I do?"

 

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