Ohio EPA orders Dayton to take action on contamination

DAYTON — The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base learned this month that test results showed Dayton’s firefighter training center on McFadden Avenue was a potential source of groundwater contamination, state and base officials say.

The disclosure comes as the city is trying to pressure Wright-Patterson to act more quickly on preventing contamination to city water supplies.

Dayton has asked the Air Force for nearly $1 million to reimburse costs for environmental testing and studies to track the contamination, which the city believes is caused by firefighting foam contaminants on the base. The city is worried the contamination will impact the Huffman Dam well field, which is about a half mile away from Wright-Patterson.

Base officials did not know until this past week that the city has had concerns about contamination from its firefighting training center, base spokeswoman Marie Vanover said.

The Ohio EPA said it was also unaware of the contamination levels. It said it only learned at a meeting with the city on Feb. 16 that sampling in monitoring wells at the Tait’s Hill well field showed high levels of what are known as perfluoroakyl substances (PFAS), a contaminant found in an old formula of aqueous film-forming foam that was used as a fire-fighting retardant.

PFAS substances are also found in consumer products from clothing to cookware.

The Tait’s Hill well field, which is adjacent to the city’s firefighting training center at 200 McFadden Ave., is part of the much larger Mad River well field, which supplies water to a broad section of the region.

Both the EPA and the city say the water distributed to customers is safe.

Until the Feb. 16 meeting, the EPA believed Wright-Patterson was the “only known source” of contamination caused from firefighting foam in the Mad River well field, according to Ohio EPA Director Craig W. Butler.

The EPA this week ordered the city to track and mitigate potential contamination from the firefighting training center and determine the source of a small level of PFAS contamination at the city’s Ottawa treatment plant in the Mad River well field.

PFAS contamination, at certain levels, can cause major health concerns. According to the U.S. EPA, human epidemiology and animal testing studies indicate high-level exposure to the contaminant may lead to testicular and liver cancer; changes in cholesterol; low birth weight in newborns; liver tissue damage; and effects on the immune system and thyroid.

The retardant that produces PFAS was sprayed at both Wright-Patterson and Dayton’s firefighting training center.

The city has been meeting with base officials over water contamination for roughly two years. In a Feb. 7 letter, the city asked local communities to join with it to pressure WrightPatterson and the Air Force to act more quickly to prevent the potential contamination of Huffman Dam production wells closed last April. Dayton sent a second letter two weeks later notifying city managers in the region about concerns tied to the Dayton firefighting training center.