Date: February 14, 2014

Recently I took the liberty to share my most recent findings in support of H.R. 543 and the contamination of Blue Water Navy vessels. For ships that anchored in VACO deep water Blue Water Navy Ports i.e., Da Nang, I've been able to prove this port is not a deep water port. Furthermore contaminated water was provided by water camels to ships at anchor while in port by means of an open water reservoir at Marble Mountain, through an 8 inch water pipeline to the water treatment plant in Da Nang. Another means were supply ships/refuelers that conducted underway replenishments at sea, topped off potable water inport Vietnam, along with fresh produce, and transferred potable water and produce to ships in need at sea. Water is a valuable commodity onboard ships. Used in boilers, laundry, galleys, freshwater washdowns, showers and sinks. Evaporators were considered high failure rate items and required demand maintenance frequently. Forcing ships on many occasions to go on water hours when potable water (fresh water) tanks ran low. My initial findings can be found here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/206829647/H-R-543-to-House-Committee-on-Veterans-Affair-and-VACO IOM Agent Orange Update 2012 (released Dec 2013) was absent of air, sediment, soil, and water samples of dioxin from the Vietnam era, but through Remediation Efforts ongoing by USAID I have recently found additional evidence to support dioxin contaminants in Da Nang (365,000 ppt) which were 365 times the global acceptable levels through 2013. Furthermore USAID utilizes a process to purge dioxin from soil that supports our ongoing view that once salt water, contaminated with Agent Orange, along the coastal territories off Vietnam, was extracted from the ocean via shipboard evaporators, that the shipboard water distillation plants, utilizing Superheaters and heat exchangers did not come close to temperatures required to purge dioxin from the potable water, thereby contaminating the entire crew. More information can be found in Chapter 7 here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/7267789/Machinist-Mate-1-C-SurfaceU.S. Navy

This is how USAID proposes to clean the contaminated soil in Da Nang: The technology is an innovative dioxin destruction technology that uses conductive heating and vacuum extraction to remediate soil and sediment contaminated with dioxins. The excavated soil and sediment is placed into a completely enclosed above-ground pile structure. Heating rods operating at temperatures of approximately 750 to 800 degrees Celsius (C) (1400 to 1500 degrees Fahrenheit [F]) raise the temperature of the entire pile to at least 335C (635F). At that temperature, the molecular bonds holding the dioxin compound together break, causing the dioxin compound to decompose into other, harmless substances, primarily CO2, H2O and Cl2. http://www.usaid.gov/vietnam/environmental-remediation-process