WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE — Wright-Patterson Air Force Base officials provided the Dayton city manager Feb. 27 with a list of actions taken by the Air Force to identify, respond to and prevent drinking water contamination linked to past firefighting activities on Wright-Patterson.
“As both the Ohio EPA and City of Dayton have stated, the drinking water is safe and we intend to continue working closely with all stakeholders to ensure it remains safe,” said Col. Bradley McDonald, 88th Air Base Wing and Installation commander.
“The Air Force is committed to protecting human health and the environment and we are working aggressively to ensure our installation and surrounding communities have access to safe drinking water.” “City leadership has requested the Air Force take urgent action and I can assure the Dayton community that we already have,” said McDonald.
PFOS and PFOA are components of many industrial and commercial products, including a legacy firefighting foam used by the Air Force and civilian airports to combat petroleum-based fires associated with aircraft fires.
Additionally, the base took an on-base well offline in April 2016 because it exceeded the Environmental Protection Agency’s then-provisional health advisory of 200 parts per trillion for PFOS.
In May 2016, the EPA established a lifetime health advisory of 70 parts per trillion of PFOS and PFOA in drinking water.
The base also installed monitoring wells on base property, quarterly sentinel monitoring wells across the installation, and plans to expand the site inspection to further identify threats to drinking water sources on and near Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
The Air Force expects to begin work in June 2018 on an expanded site inspection which will include continued quarterly sentinel well monitoring at the base boundary.
If the site inspection determines PFOS/PFOA are migrating off the installation at levels above the EPA advisory, the Air Force will take additional actions.
To ensure a comprehensive investigation into potential threats to community drinking water, the Air Force encouraged the city to investigate whether civilian fire training centers and commercial operations are impacting drinking water well fields and treatment plants.