State health officials have enlisted a team of experts to investigate allegations of a cancer cluster among Anne Arundel County firefighters who trained using potentially dangerous chemicals decades ago.
The county Health Department asked the state to look into the issue last week, prompted in part by concerns of relatives of sick or dead firefighters.
Dr. Jonathan M. Samet, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, will investigate whether cancer clusters exist among county firefighters.
"We decided that because of the seriousness of the situation that we would work with experts in the state," said Dr. Russell Moy, director of family health administration for the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Interim county Fire Chief Frances B. Phillips said the department isn't specifically looking into concerns that transformer oil used at the Fire Training Academy in Millersville decades ago might be linked to cancer cases.
Chief Phillips said she wants to wait until experts decide what course the investigation should take.
"It's not something to speculate," she said. "It's something to throw open an investigation by the experts who know what they're looking for."
Dr. Samet said his investigation could take about six months, though it's too early to say for certain. His group will review literature on cancer in firefighters, the state's Cancer Registry and other data.
After that review, Dr. Samet will decide whether a more detailed study is warranted.
The investigation is focusing on broader concerns about cancer rates in firefighters, not solely the possible training academy exposure, and there is no proof the firefighters were sickened by the transformer oil.
Reconstructing events at the acad- emy will take time, Chief Phillips said, since many of the records are at least 20 years old.
Experts, including some who have seen other such investigations across the nation, caution that finding specific causes in cancer cases is very difficult - especially among firefighters, who are exposed to carcinogens nearly every time they go into a burning building.
Cindy Fowler of Pasadena, whose husband David is gravely ill with non-Hodgkins lymphoma, said the county has known about the concerns for years and she's angry no one has looked into them before now.
"I'm just hoping that everything that's done now will benefit the firefighters who haven't been diagnosed who will be in the future," she said.
Calls for help
After years of speculation among firefighters that cancer cases could be linked to training exercises in the 1970s and '80s, a relative of a retired firefighter diagnosed with brain cancer contacted the county in November.
She said her brother-in-law had the disease, and she knew of three others who received the same diagnosis in the last four years. The county would not release the names, citing confidentiality rules.
In 1977, the federal government banned the manufacture of polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, which are used as coolants and lubricants in transformers, capacitors and other electrical equipment, because they were found to cause cancer in animals.
In the 1970s, the county Fire Department used transformer oil from Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., along with other fuels it got for free, to start fires.
Kenneth Berman, a lawyer representing a number of firefighters or their families, said firefighters from Prince George's County, Baltimore-Washington International Airport, Baltimore City, Fort George G. Meade and the Naval Academy also trained at the Millersville academy.
But locating those possibly affected is tough. Even retirees from the county ranks are difficult to find, Chief Phillips said, because many live outside the county or the state.
The county has records of cancer cases gleaned from a state database, but the information is limited and sometimes incomplete.
Bruce Poore, president of the union that represents Naval Academy firefighters, said he is very concerned after hearing stories from those who trained at Millersville.
He knows of no cancer cases among his ranks, but recalled being at the Fire Training Academy years ago and seeing instructors wade through "the pit," which looked like a shallow above-ground pool.
About 4-feet-deep and 20-feet-wide, the pit was mostly filled with water. The transformer oil was poured on top and lit during fire suppression training exercises.
Instructors sometimes had to draw water from the pool, Firefighter Poore said, because too much water could cause the oil to spatter.
"At those times, we didn't wear air masks on those types of fires," he said. "That's the thing that deeply concerns me."
"The pit" was closed and was cleaned up in the early to mid-1980s, though a county Fire Department spokesman couldn't say exactly when.
'Burying my friends'
When John Naumann Sr. of Pasadena died of leukemia in 1994 at the age of 33, now-retired firefighter Cindy Ell wondered how her robust friend could have become so sick, since he was the only one who would climb the aerial ladder at the Jacobsville station.
Since then, other friends of Ms. Ell's have fallen ill and died. She helped arrange Edgewater resident John Dull's funeral three years ago, after he died of brain cancer at the age of 50. Now her friend Mr. Fowler, also 50, is gravely ill from non-Hodgkins lymphoma. All three men participated in drills using transformer oil.
After her friends started getting sick, Ms. Ell sought out other firefighters with cancer and now works as a paralegal for Mr. Berman, who is looking into the issue for clients.
Like Mrs. Fowler, Ms. Ell, of Delaware, said the county Fire Department should have started looking into the concerns years ago, but regarded them as little more than rumors.
"Everybody should be working in harmony to find cancers and determine what the whole story is," she said. "When the fire service loses one of its own, not only does the immediete family grieve, but the community that person comes from also suffers a loss."
At some point firefighters' relatives could file a lawsuit, but Ms. Ell said she's not in it for money.
"I'm tired of burying my friends," she said. "That's my motivation."
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