Ben Carter is a water safety expert and a caring family man. Passionate about his work, Carter went to Iraq to support the troops and reconstruction efforts. Yet soon after he arrived in Iraq he found KBR/Halliburton cutting essential corners, resulting in U.S. troops being forced to shower in wastewater. KBR’s indifference to the contaminated water led Carter to resign. Since leaving Iraq he’s spoken out about Halliburton, was one of the subjects of Brave New Films' documentary, "Iraq For Sale," testified before the Democratic Policy Committee and worked to warn soldiers of the dangers of contaminated water.
Carter participated in a series of e-mail interviews with Progressive Future's Kate Drazner in June to talk about his experiences and spread the word about his quest to bring KBR to justice. Here's his story:
I had been operating my own company in the fall of 2004, when my 20-year-old son suddenly died from a bad combination of prescription medication. This tragedy caused my marriage to end only a month later. With little reason to stay in Utah, I pursued the opportunity of going to work for Halliburton, because I had gotten word that Halliburton was looking for people with expertise in water purification to operate their reverse osmosis water purification units (ROWPU). I had extensive experience with a wide range of water purification technologies, and I was attracted to the idea of providing a valuable service to our soldiers serving in Iraq. At the time, I was very excited at the prospect of being an employee once again, doing great things with providing clean safe water to U.S. troops and seeing some exciting places around the world. This was before I learned anything about Halliburton and their business practices.
If you recall, in late 2004 the war in Iraq was
thought to be over after the declaration of "mission
accomplished" by President George W. Bush. This impression was
clearly wrong once I arrived and was sent to the base at Ar Ramadi.
The talk around the water coolers was that the KBR camp there was
getting hit on a regular schedule with rocket and mortar fire. This
was a surprise to me since my recruiter had told me that I would be
sent to the green zone in Baghdad. When I arrived in Ar Ramadi I was
anxious to get to work right away. It was at the air base, Al Asad,
that I got my first indication that things were askew with their
water treatment plants.
While waiting to finish up with
orientation, I saw the first of many serious deficiencies regarding
the water purification for U.S. troops. We were instructed to have
the managers in our job field sign off on our time sheet to indicate
we had worked 12 hours each day. The fact of the matter was we were
actually just making an appearance in order to obtain the necessary
signature for the time sheets. While this weighed a little on my
conscience, I concluded that this is just a transitional problem and
surely when I got to my permanent station I would have more work than
I could handle every day. So, while I was at the ROWPU water plant
for Al Asad air base, I was given a tour of the facility by a KBR
ROWPU operator and was surprised that they were using the rejected
drainage water from the ROWPU process and using it for the production
of potable and non-potable water. I questioned him about this
problem. He answered by saying I had a lot to learn about working
here, and that replacement cost was not an issue.
A big
problem with re-using the contaminated waste water is the increase of
contaminants previously in the raw water. For example, let's say
there are 100 giardia
cysts [giardia is an infectious parasite which lodges in the
intestines and causes vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss and
dehydration] in each gallon of raw water run into the R.O. unit. We
could reasonably expect the R.O. to remove 90% to 95% of the cysts,
which would be flushed out in the reject effluent drain line. This
process would therefore produce about 1/3 gallon of very high quality
drinking water and the other 2/3 gallon was being sent back to the
collection tank for the water plant. When they dumped that water with
a now higher concentration of cysts back into the feed water,
eventually the treated drinking water and non-potable water would no
longer be safe to use. Eventually that number of 100 cysts per gallon
would become 1,000 per gallon, then 10,0000, etc.
This water
contains a high concentration of all the dissolved contaminants
present in the raw water. Heavy metals, pesticides, bacteria,
viruses, etc., etc. Which is why it's considered a potentially
hazardous waste product. It was this water that I personally
witnessed being dumped back into the supply water at the KBR water
plant in Al Asad!
The non-potable water was delivered to the
base daily by KBR trucks driving outside the base to a small military
ROWPU unit operating next to the Euphrates river temporarily until
KBR could get their big ROWPU units on-line. I had been told that
this water was chlorinated and safe by my supervisor ROWPU foreman
Walter Meyers. I eventually discovered that not to be true. Then, I
found out that KBR site management was aware of this fact the entire
time, knowingly compromising the safety of the thousands of troops
who had water storage tanks all over the base being pumped with
contaminated water each day.
After my initial shock of
discovering that KBR was delivering contaminated water to the
unsuspecting consumers, I immediately went to work first by
decontaminating the water system and then asking questions to
military personnel in charge of their ROWPU unit. I learned that
their only responsibility was for the production of potable water and
they were doing a fine job of producing it for the dinning facility
and the hospital. They never questioned what KBR was doing with all
that water they were obtaining; they thought it was used for dust
abatement on the roads on base. It was obvious to me that the
military had been waiting far too patiently for KBR to get their
ROWPU up and running like they had been promised.
After I
finished with the emergency super chlorination and fact-finding, I
prepared an incident report to provide to the KBR health and safety
manager at his request. The managers made it clear to me that the
whole issue was over now and I was instructed to stop e-mailing
anybody outside of Ar Ramadi. When I asked the KBR Site manager that
I at least be allowed to notify the military personnel in charge of
all the water tanks on the base, she told me, "The military is
none of our f---king concern." This was appalling to my sense of
why I was there trying to help our military.
A few days
later, there was an all hands meeting where the water issue was
disclosed by management. We were all told the problem was solved and
there was nothing to worry about. I knew this was absolutely untrue
and was also offended that they had not consulted with me prior to
this announcement. I knew that if I chose to remain loyal to KBR
management and simply go along with looking the other way, a day
would come when this story got out. And it would be me who would be
blamed for not doing more to ensure the safety of everybody using
this water on the base. It upset me to realize how shameful KBR
management was about the entire situation. I decided to resign in
protest and do whatever I could to alert people once I returned to
the U.S.
Upon my return to the U.S. I immediately made the
effort to get examined for infectious water borne diseases from my
exposure to water treated by KBR at military bases in Iraq. When
Halliburton placed one road block after another to make this as
difficult as they possibly could for me, I realized that I had no
choice but to find a lawyer who would help me through the convoluted
process of filing a claim against Halliburton and KBR. Because
Halliburton contested my initial request for medical testing, I was
forced to go through a year and a half of waiting to go to trial
before an Administrative Law court. I was finally seen by an
Infectious disease specialist. My opinion is that Hallibuton uses
this lengthy process to make it so difficult for former employees
that they will be forced to give up on their desire to seek medical
treatment.
I told the senior manager of employee labor
relations that I wanted the problems corrected at all the bases and
that I wanted Halliburton to notify ALL the troops who had been
exposed to this water of the potential of serious health risks, and
that all the troops should be tested for potential infections. He
denied my request! That was the day that I provided Halliburton with
my prepared press release that I intended to send out to every media
outlet I could find who would start making this outrage a news story.
When I learned how long and difficult this road was going to
be for me, I decided that I would do whatever it took to see this
through to the end. Which meant that while I was fighting every day
to be seen and treated by a doctor, I also started working around the
clock to make it known exactly what Halliburton was doing to our
troops and fellow citizen contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. I was
so disturbed by what I witnessed in Iraq and the poor treatment I
received from Halliburton, I knew that if I didn't do something,
nobody would ever know why they got sick in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Thoughts ran through my head of my friends still in Iraq. If I didn't
do something big, I would have personally been responsible for the
health of all these people. My background has taught me how many
millions of people who have died from contaminated water sources.
This was simply a matter of conscience that I couldn't live with.
Throughout the multitude of abuses KBR has been
accused of, the U.S. Department of Justice has yet to hold KBR
accountable. Next week, Carter will be sharing the story of his
involvement in a lawsuit waged against KBR, and his observations on
why the DOJ is dragging its feet on the KBR prosecution. Stay tuned
for his powerful story, which has not been published
anywhere.
Meanwhile, KBR has made it clear that neither the
health of its employees, nor its support of the military is a
concern. The only apparent concern of the contracting company is
money. That's why we're launching a campaign to cut off KBR until
they prove that they deserve the billions of tax dollars the
Department of Defense awards them each year. Tell the DoD you don't
want your tax money going to fund KBR's abuses by e-mailing the DoD's
Chief Financial Officer, Tina Jonas, and urging her not to pay KBR
until the Justice Department completes a full, public investigation
of KBR and its abuses.
To learn more about Ben and his experiences watch this video clip from Brave New Films' "Iraq For Sale" :
Ben Carter is a water safety expert and a caring family man. Passionate about his work, Carter went to Iraq to support the troops and reconstruction efforts. Yet soon after he arrived in Iraq he found KBR/Halliburton cutting essential corners, resulting in U.S. troops being forced to shower in wastewater. KBR’s indifference to the contaminated water led Carter to resign. Since leaving Iraq he’s spoken out about Halliburton, was one of the subjects of Brave New Films' documentary, "Iraq For Sale," testified before the Democratic Policy Committee and worked to warn soldiers of the dangers of contaminated water.
Carter participated in a series of e-mail interviews with Progressive Future's Kate Drazner in June to talk about his experiences and spread the word about his quest to bring KBR to justice. Here's his story:
I had been operating my own company in the fall of 2004, when my 20-year-old son suddenly died from a bad combination of prescription medication. This tragedy caused my marriage to end only a month later. With little reason to stay in Utah, I pursued the opportunity of going to work for Halliburton, because I had gotten word that Halliburton was looking for people with expertise in water purification to operate their reverse osmosis water purification units (ROWPU). I had extensive experience with a wide range of water purification technologies, and I was attracted to the idea of providing a valuable service to our soldiers serving in Iraq. At the time, I was very excited at the prospect of being an employee once again, doing great things with providing clean safe water to U.S. troops and seeing some exciting places around the world. This was before I learned anything about Halliburton and their business practices.
If you recall, in late 2004 the war in Iraq was
thought to be over after the declaration of "mission
accomplished" by President George W. Bush. This impression was
clearly wrong once I arrived and was sent to the base at Ar Ramadi.
The talk around the water coolers was that the KBR camp there was
getting hit on a regular schedule with rocket and mortar fire. This
was a surprise to me since my recruiter had told me that I would be
sent to the green zone in Baghdad. When I arrived in Ar Ramadi I was
anxious to get to work right away. It was at the air base, Al Asad,
that I got my first indication that things were askew with their
water treatment plants.
While waiting to finish up with
orientation, I saw the first of many serious deficiencies regarding
the water purification for U.S. troops. We were instructed to have
the managers in our job field sign off on our time sheet to indicate
we had worked 12 hours each day. The fact of the matter was we were
actually just making an appearance in order to obtain the necessary
signature for the time sheets. While this weighed a little on my
conscience, I concluded that this is just a transitional problem and
surely when I got to my permanent station I would have more work than
I could handle every day. So, while I was at the ROWPU water plant
for Al Asad air base, I was given a tour of the facility by a KBR
ROWPU operator and was surprised that they were using the rejected
drainage water from the ROWPU process and using it for the production
of potable and non-potable water. I questioned him about this
problem. He answered by saying I had a lot to learn about working
here, and that replacement cost was not an issue.
A big
problem with re-using the contaminated waste water is the increase of
contaminants previously in the raw water. For example, let's say
there are 100 giardia
cysts [giardia is an infectious parasite which lodges in the
intestines and causes vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss and
dehydration] in each gallon of raw water run into the R.O. unit. We
could reasonably expect the R.O. to remove 90% to 95% of the cysts,
which would be flushed out in the reject effluent drain line. This
process would therefore produce about 1/3 gallon of very high quality
drinking water and the other 2/3 gallon was being sent back to the
collection tank for the water plant. When they dumped that water with
a now higher concentration of cysts back into the feed water,
eventually the treated drinking water and non-potable water would no
longer be safe to use. Eventually that number of 100 cysts per gallon
would become 1,000 per gallon, then 10,0000, etc.
This water
contains a high concentration of all the dissolved contaminants
present in the raw water. Heavy metals, pesticides, bacteria,
viruses, etc., etc. Which is why it's considered a potentially
hazardous waste product. It was this water that I personally
witnessed being dumped back into the supply water at the KBR water
plant in Al Asad!
The non-potable water was delivered to the
base daily by KBR trucks driving outside the base to a small military
ROWPU unit operating next to the Euphrates river temporarily until
KBR could get their big ROWPU units on-line. I had been told that
this water was chlorinated and safe by my supervisor ROWPU foreman
Walter Meyers. I eventually discovered that not to be true. Then, I
found out that KBR site management was aware of this fact the entire
time, knowingly compromising the safety of the thousands of troops
who had water storage tanks all over the base being pumped with
contaminated water each day.
After my initial shock of
discovering that KBR was delivering contaminated water to the
unsuspecting consumers, I immediately went to work first by
decontaminating the water system and then asking questions to
military personnel in charge of their ROWPU unit. I learned that
their only responsibility was for the production of potable water and
they were doing a fine job of producing it for the dinning facility
and the hospital. They never questioned what KBR was doing with all
that water they were obtaining; they thought it was used for dust
abatement on the roads on base. It was obvious to me that the
military had been waiting far too patiently for KBR to get their
ROWPU up and running like they had been promised.
After I
finished with the emergency super chlorination and fact-finding, I
prepared an incident report to provide to the KBR health and safety
manager at his request. The managers made it clear to me that the
whole issue was over now and I was instructed to stop e-mailing
anybody outside of Ar Ramadi. When I asked the KBR Site manager that
I at least be allowed to notify the military personnel in charge of
all the water tanks on the base, she told me, "The military is
none of our f---king concern." This was appalling to my sense of
why I was there trying to help our military.
A few days
later, there was an all hands meeting where the water issue was
disclosed by management. We were all told the problem was solved and
there was nothing to worry about. I knew this was absolutely untrue
and was also offended that they had not consulted with me prior to
this announcement. I knew that if I chose to remain loyal to KBR
management and simply go along with looking the other way, a day
would come when this story got out. And it would be me who would be
blamed for not doing more to ensure the safety of everybody using
this water on the base. It upset me to realize how shameful KBR
management was about the entire situation. I decided to resign in
protest and do whatever I could to alert people once I returned to
the U.S.
Upon my return to the U.S. I immediately made the
effort to get examined for infectious water borne diseases from my
exposure to water treated by KBR at military bases in Iraq. When
Halliburton placed one road block after another to make this as
difficult as they possibly could for me, I realized that I had no
choice but to find a lawyer who would help me through the convoluted
process of filing a claim against Halliburton and KBR. Because
Halliburton contested my initial request for medical testing, I was
forced to go through a year and a half of waiting to go to trial
before an Administrative Law court. I was finally seen by an
Infectious disease specialist. My opinion is that Hallibuton uses
this lengthy process to make it so difficult for former employees
that they will be forced to give up on their desire to seek medical
treatment.
I told the senior manager of employee labor
relations that I wanted the problems corrected at all the bases and
that I wanted Halliburton to notify ALL the troops who had been
exposed to this water of the potential of serious health risks, and
that all the troops should be tested for potential infections. He
denied my request! That was the day that I provided Halliburton with
my prepared press release that I intended to send out to every media
outlet I could find who would start making this outrage a news story.
When I learned how long and difficult this road was going to
be for me, I decided that I would do whatever it took to see this
through to the end. Which meant that while I was fighting every day
to be seen and treated by a doctor, I also started working around the
clock to make it known exactly what Halliburton was doing to our
troops and fellow citizen contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. I was
so disturbed by what I witnessed in Iraq and the poor treatment I
received from Halliburton, I knew that if I didn't do something,
nobody would ever know why they got sick in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Thoughts ran through my head of my friends still in Iraq. If I didn't
do something big, I would have personally been responsible for the
health of all these people. My background has taught me how many
millions of people who have died from contaminated water sources.
This was simply a matter of conscience that I couldn't live with.
Throughout the multitude of abuses KBR has been
accused of, the U.S. Department of Justice has yet to hold KBR
accountable. Next week, Carter will be sharing the story of his
involvement in a lawsuit waged against KBR, and his observations on
why the DOJ is dragging its feet on the KBR prosecution. Stay tuned
for his powerful story, which has not been published
anywhere.
Meanwhile, KBR has made it clear that neither the
health of its employees, nor its support of the military is a
concern. The only apparent concern of the contracting company is
money. That's why we're launching a campaign to cut off KBR until
they prove that they deserve the billions of tax dollars the
Department of Defense awards them each year. Tell the DoD you don't
want your tax money going to fund KBR's abuses by e-mailing the DoD's
Chief Financial Officer, Tina Jonas, and urging her not to pay KBR
until the Justice Department completes a full, public investigation
of KBR and its abuses.
To learn more about Ben and his experiences watch this video clip from Brave New Films' "Iraq For Sale" :
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