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Agent Orange in "trash haulers"


AGENT222
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OK I' Going to start out with an easy one.  I was PCS at Little Rock from 02/1974-03/1978.  I was never" boots on the ground" in SEA. Now I have Parkinson's.  Did anyone ever see small amounts of Agent Orange  brought in to forward bases for use in perimeter security?  I'm trying to establish that the aircraft I worked on every day for four years were contaminated and thus I became contaminated too.  Thanks

LBG

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I was loadmaster from May 70 til July 71. I don't recall ever hauling any agent orange. All of the forward fields had the perimeters sprayed but all the applications I ever saw were from Aircraft. I don't think we had any C-130s that I flew with any residue. If any drums of haz mat or any liquid were leaking we would bump them. Even in war you can't fly around with liquids leaking on the Aircraft.

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I personally think that my plane ,#62-1804 , which I was crew chief on at CCK from Mar. 1969--June 1970, carried containers that contained Agent Orange on several or more occasions during that time. I knew what agent Orange smelled like from hanging around some of the C-123 Ranch Hands parked over near the terminal at CRB. I would walk over there from my plane to get something to eat. Maybe even from the In Flight Kitchen. I even Sat on the ramp of one of them and ate chicken in the shade. The smell of that strong weed killer was easy to remember. That smell occurred in the cargo compartment of my plane from time to time over the period of the 15 months I went to CRB on 1804. From what I can figure, the smell in my plane came from pallets of mostly odds and ends including barrels strapped on together. I cleaned the whole plane after every mission, and never cleaned up what I would call spills, but wet oily spots were common. Just ask any crew chief.  During that time I just assumed that the agent Orange smell was annoying, but harmless. I had no reason to believe otherwise. Remember the green cans of DDT ?  Another case of using something harmful but hell, it was standard equipment in the aircraft and the barracks.                                                  Anyway, I know my plane lived it's final years at the Rock and I would imagine many other Viet Nam trash haulers did also.

Maybe you can make a legitimate claim. I hope you can. Also, since the war, those C-123 Ranch Hands were legally behind many agent Orange claims from men who were never in Viet Nam but had claims approved by the VA in recent years.

Just my opinions and hopefully I am wrong because I might have to prove boots on the ground someday due to an Agent Orange claim.

Also, thinking back, I am sure the weed spray smell that I lived with for 18 months at Naha and Viet Nam, were the same stuff I smelled as CCK for the next 15 months.

Ken

 

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Ken you know one mans trash was another mans treasure. Having the perimeters defoliated at the forward fields made it easier to keep charlie from setting up under final approach. At the time it was a good thing. I was pretty much by the book and refused loads if any leakage was noted. While some might have been flown out to the field in barrels for local application most was delivered via the air in the C-123 sprayers. Looked like giant crop dusters.  

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On 7/4/2017 at 7:22 PM, Mt.crewchief said:

I personally think that my plane ,#62-1804 , which I was crew chief on at CCK from Mar. 1969--June 1970, carried containers that contained Agent Orange on several or more occasions during that time. I knew what agent Orange smelled like from hanging around some of the C-123 Ranch Hands parked over near the terminal at CRB. I would walk over there from my plane to get something to eat. Maybe even from the In Flight Kitchen. I even Sat on the ramp of one of them and ate chicken in the shade. The smell of that strong weed killer was easy to remember. That smell occurred in the cargo compartment of my plane from time to time over the period of the 15 months I went to CRB on 1804. From what I can figure, the smell in my plane came from pallets of mostly odds and ends including barrels strapped on together. I cleaned the whole plane after every mission, and never cleaned up what I would call spills, but wet oily spots were common. Just ask any crew chief.  During that time I just assumed that the agent Orange smell was annoying, but harmless. I had no reason to believe otherwise. Remember the green cans of DDT ?  Another case of using something harmful but hell, it was standard equipment in the aircraft and the barracks.                                                  Anyway, I know my plane lived it's final years at the Rock and I would imagine many other Viet Nam trash haulers did also.

Maybe you can make a legitimate claim. I hope you can. Also, since the war, those C-123 Ranch Hands were legally behind many agent Orange claims from men who were never in Viet Nam but had claims approved by the VA in recent years.

Just my opinions and hopefully I am wrong because I might have to prove boots on the ground someday due to an Agent Orange claim.

Also, thinking back, I am sure the weed spray smell that I lived with for 18 months at Naha and Viet Nam, were the same stuff I smelled as CCK for the next 15 months.

Ken

 

Ken, like you and Sonny I was at Naha Sep 68 to Jun 70 with trips to TSN and CRB and all over Nam, we were still using the green cans of stuff during my deployments to DS/DS 90-91 and my 2 Iraq and Afghanistan deployments 03-04 & 05-06 in fact saw a LT after too many beers spray his fatigues while still in them not a pretty site ! I believe I worked on #62-1804 in either Thumbrait Oman or Balad Afghanistan or it could have been the Deid in Qatar a lot of the "E" s 62-63 models were still in use with Reserve units in the 80's and 90's in fact at Willow Grove Pa. we had 12 #63 models which at one time were Dyess plans way back when. We lost them back to active duty when that firefighting "A" collapsed both wings while dropping retardant in California in 2000. After wing box inspections , the Rock Dyess and Pope came and took our 63's because we had fairly new wing boxes which were done PDM in the mid 80's. I am sure Bob Delay can verify that. When WG closed in 2007 I had already PCS'd to Pope with the 440th out of Milwaukee where I retired in 2009 with 29 years albeit with a split in service 1972 - 1985 One more thing the C-123's that went to the Reserves and guard the places they were sent the main folks now are part of agent orange because of working on them and flying them the years before they were sent to bone yard. 

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  • 9 months later...

To be really honest, we rarely knew what we were carrying other than special handling cargo. Most missions carried ammunition and/or POL. Logistical missions carried general cargo. If anything, herbicides would have been corrosive liquids. They most likely weren't labeled at all. I understand that herbicides were marked with a band, which is where the "agent orange" moniker came from. Vietnam veterans are considered presumptive to exposure to herbicides because they were so widely used. 

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