In the Navy’s response to the recent Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) report on its drinking water system, Rear Adm. Stephen Barnett said, “My team has worked with the EPA and numerous stakeholders to sample and test these homes so all our residents can be assured their water remains safe and clean” (“Fuel found in some homes on Navy water system, new EPA report finds,” Star-Advertiser, Dec. 22).

What Rear Adm. Barnett failed to disclose is that all of the residents who were part of the EPA’s investigation attributed a resurgence of medical symptoms to the current water, which ironically align with the same symptoms they had at the peak of the Red Hill contamination in November 2021. Symptoms include a full body rash on an infant that appeared after bathing, migraines and gastrointestinal issues.

In addition, 3 of the 4 homes tested positive for total petroleum hydrocarbons (TPH) ranging from 56 parts per billion (ppb) to 71.2 ppb. Although this is below the “safe” environmental action level (EAL) of 266 ppb, people are still having harmful reactions in relation to the water. It’s almost as if drinking and bathing in jet-fuel-contami- nated water at any level is harmful to one’s health.

Last, the EPA in its report came to the conclusion that since the Waiawa shaft from where residents are currently getting their water is free of TPH, that the contaminants are coming from hot water heaters and the plumbing. As a result, the EPA made the recommendation that many Red Hill families have been begging for since Day One: to replace contaminated hot water heaters and plumbing. So far the Navy has dodged, stalled or denied this request for two years.

I would like to remind the Navy, and Hawaii’s Department of Health (DOH), the definition of safe: “Protected from or not exposed to danger or risk; not likely to be harmed or lost.”

The water is not safe if it is causing medical symptoms. The EAL for TPH does not take into account human health, and at this point is a meaningless number that the Navy and DOH cling to, to justify inaction.

It is time for the Navy, DOH and EPA to go back to the drawing board and revise the drinking water standards for its Long-Term Monitoring Plan that was developed in early 2022. Although this plan was created with the best of intentions, it is leaving out the very people it was meant to protect. There is no recourse or options for families who are drinking and bathing in water that is making them sick because the agreed-upon numbers are still too high.

The Navy needs to start protecting its own servicemembers, their families and the civilians they swore to protect and defend. The Navy’s leaders are constantly expressing how much they care about their people and people of Oahu. However, many Red Hill families and residents feel that they are being treated more like a liability instead of an asset.

Perhaps with all the money that is coming in from the federal government to close and remediate the environmental impacts of Red Hill, the Department of Defense can use some of the funding to replace the hot water heaters and plumbing that are still making people sick today. Then maybe the Navy can finally show the leadership and goodwill that so many have been craving.

Lindsey Wilson and her family lived at the Aliamanu Military Reservation during the 2021 Red Hill water crisis; now in Helena, Mont., after her husband retired from the Navy, she continues to monitor and advocate for families over the Red Hill situation.