It has been over a month since we were made aware that a huge fuel leak had spilled into our water source. During this whole-time thousands of families have been displaced, living in different hotels all throughout Oahu and waiting for the water systems to be flushed and tested in order to go back home.
Even though we have all been affected by this horrifying fuel leak, everybody’s situation is different.
The main areas affected are the Aliamanu Military Reservation (AMR), Redhill and Navy housing outside the Joint-Base Pearl Harbor Hickam area. AMR and Redhill housing areas are part of the U.S Army housing contracts and they are tackling the issue way differently that the Navy. Instead of combining forces to help everyone affected they are both doing their own planning and execution.
Our family resides on AMR but we are a Navy family therefore many things apply differently to us. On December 9th the U.S Army issued an emergency authorization which allows All Department of Defense personnel, civilian employees (including NAF personnel), and their dependents who live on Aliamanu Military Reservation and Red Hill and all U.S. Army personnel, including dependents, residing in those impacted areas specific allowances to cover the costs of lodging, meals and incidentals. Families under these categories were procured lodging by the Army and are using their Government Travel Card or their own financial institutions and then filing TLA claims for reimbursement.
As far as the Navy goes, they never issued an emergency authorization or haven’t even mentioned how much of a crisis the situation truly is.
For Navy families in affected areas, we are allowed Government procured lodging if the Service Member has a Government Travel Card. If not, each family has to self-procure lodging on their own. During the holidays the DOD TLA allowance increased due to holiday rates for lodging going up however after January 4th that same TLA allowance decreased after the holidays but the hotels around the island kept their room rates the same. This made it difficult for many families including ours to find a safe and affordable place to stay at. We had to check out of one hotel and check in at another hotel the same day since the one we were at kept their rates high. This was such a stressful period for us but after calling many hotels we finally found one that provided us with a budget-friendly room within our TLA rate where we could have safe water.
Currently the U.S Army is holding Town Hall meetings to keep the community informed of all the work they are doing to keep us safe. I am thankful that the families residing under the U.S Army housing have had the transparency we have been wanting all along from at least one branch. The Navy is still standing by the fact that not all areas under their command are affected, however, they have shut down certain areas for caution such as the restaurant establishments at the NEX. Other housing communities have experienced the fuel-like smell in their water, however, they are still being told the water is ok. How is that possible? The Navy is also doing town hall meetings however none have allowed an in-person crowd to ask live questions instead they are using Facebook live to do their town halls and answering questions that people are having to submit through e-mail and even so it seems as if they are choosing to only answer certain questions. Their town halls are around 20 minutes while the U.S Army goes on for over 1 hour and has a panel of selected personnel answering all sorts of questions from finance issues to science-based explanations to cater to the questions pertaining fuel and such.
Both branches have set up a flushing system in which water will be sent down the main water lines in large volumes and high speeds to get rid of the contaminated water. Then flushing will happen at home which is the step we are at now in some communities such as Joint-base Pearl Harbor Hickam; the home flushing will require families alongside housing maintenance representative or Military personnel to flush the lines and appliances in each home. Once all the flushing is done samples will be collected for testing and sent to a lab certified by the Hawaii Department of Health and the U.S Environmental Protection Agency.
As of January 4th, one of the test results from the flushing conducted at AMR communities has failed and does not meet the standards to allow us to move back home. The next step is to proceed with another flush until the tests come back within standards. On January 6th, the U.S Army hosted another town hall meeting where it was stated that due to the failed tests we would probably be out of our homes until mid-February however Task Force Ohana is 100% showing the community that they are all about our safety and moving us back into our homes when it is fully safe and all tests pass.
Until then, we will keep driving back and forth between lodging and our home and to be honest our home does not feel quite the same. Our new décor is water bottles, our must-haves include items that make our living situation simpler; paper plates and disposable utensils fill our kitchen counters, water pick up is on our to do list every other day, hauling the kids to the nearest laundromat along all laundry baskets and duffel bags can be overwhelming, trusting to have clean water wherever we go is always on my mind, doing house chores has become even more of a chore…how much water do you use to mop floors?
I think of all the ways in which we take water for granted and it blows my mind that we are in this situation. It is overwhelming, stressful, sad and it makes me angry that due to the U.S Navy’s neglect thousands of families are living like this.
We always hear “Support our troops,” but how is this not making more headlines? How is this not making more people angry and involved in what is happening on Oahu? Not only for our military families, but for the local population. We should all be taking care of each other and this island which we have called our home.