In the news last night the McCord Air Force base fire fighters had a spill of fire foam. Anyone catch this headline and what's that stuff going to do to the fish??? They say nothing will happen, so they say.People have big problems with Indians nets, I'm one that don't agree with their walls of death. But looking at this tid-bit of info on regional news makes me think we should be cleaning our own back yards. The declining numbers are easy to blame on the yellow man,but if we pour piss in a stream it doesn't help the fish either.Thank about it, if the armed forces can screw up this bad, what the hell else is happening right now? J.C.B

[This message has been edited by J.C.B (edited 12-23-2000).]

Yes, I fully agree.
We need to look at all the pieces to this puzzle. Look what happened back east earlier this year with the whiskey factory catching fire and spilling thousands of gallons of whisky into the river and killing millions of fish.

They say that the foam dissolves in water, and that the water tested fine. But how are we to know? What are they testing for? Ph levels? Do they even know what they are looking for with these types of chemicals?

Now how do you hold the Feds/Military responsible?

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"Just Say No To Sovereign Nations!"

How much was spilled and where did it go? AFFF concentrate is toxic. Here's a MSDS for AFFF, http://www.denkofoam.com/data3_6.htm. I've never seen fish bioassay data. One of the major environmental concerns is the foam can cause problems with sewage treatment plants and also could suffocate fish if it gets into water ways.

This link doesn't work. If you want to see the MSDS do a search for AFFF and one of the sites will have a MSDS available.

[This message has been edited by Steelheadman (edited 12-23-2000).]

To answer Rivers' question above, military and other gov't agencies can be fined by EPA or USCG and required to pay for cleanup or damage. Only difference, compared to a business, is that we taxpayers end up with the bills!

we use AFFF at the fire dept I work for and if you get this stuff on metal it eats it up with time. I have no idea what it would do to the rivers but I'll be checking, besides our govt. wouldn't lie to us would they?

the little creek going under the air field comes out of spanaway lake and the springs above it. the creek flows down thru lake steilacoom and past the salmon hatchery. from the it goes into the creek just north of the town of Steilacoom where it flows into the bay.
Many years ago the miltary/air force used this creek as a dumping site for who knows what. They goverment had to clean the creek up 10-12 years ago.
Spanaway was used as a silver holding pond in hopes that a new stain of fish wouls start migrating back into these waters. The state dumped thousands of smolts into spanaway in the early fall to swin and feed on the little red worms the inhabit the bottom of spanaway. hopefully they would come back up and get caught at the hatchery. well as far as i have heard thsi did not work very well so far. the fish are not being dumped in the last 2 years, unless no one is telling, i the hatchery is or has been closed down.
the fish just could not make the run thru all the confluted waters to get the salt.

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elmtree (woody)

say i work in those hangers, they have their own drain tanks,they were just redone.and silvers have showed up at the golf course in parkland and chum come back up that creek and spawn in lake wood.if you know were the high school is in lake wood walk from the south end corner you will come across the creek were they come up

This may be old news by now, but I saw an article in a newspaper, I think it was the Olympian, maybe the Tacoma fishwrap.
The readers digest version stated that the US Gov't (military) cannot be fined for the spill, but they can be forced to pay cleanup fees. Evidently some agency, I couldnt guess who, is on it.

Guys, I'm in the military, and can tell you that we are usually as careful as we can be, and still do our job, which is by the way, to be ready to defend your right to fish! We are subject to the same rules and regulations concerning environmental hazards as the rest of the businesses around the sound, and have the same EPA inspectors inspect us as inspect other business that deal in hazardous waste. Also, if an environmental incident happens that is determined to be a case of willful neglect, INDIVIDUALS, not the government, are held responsible, with huge fines/job loss a possibility. On Fort Lewis, for example, if you spill oil, fuel, or anything else that is considered hazardous material the HAZMAT team responds, and supervises the containment and cleanup of the spill to EPA standards. I'm sure that the folks on McChord do the same.
Greg