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“Waiki`i Ranch Dust Samples Show No Depleted Uranium” is apparently receiving a skeptical response from local and international scientific experts, according to our friends at Malu `Aina on Hawai`i Island.

The report posted a “statistically insignificant” amount of depleted uranium (DU) in the community of Waiki`i, 8 – 10 miles downwind of Pohakuloa Training Area (PTA), where the Army admitted in 2006 to using DU spotting rounds for its Davy Crockett nuclear weapons system. The test is based on a sample taken by Waiki`i Ranch Depleted Uranium Project Manager, David Bigelow, and sent to a laboratory in England for analysis.

From Malu `Aina guys:

Dr.Rosalie Bertell, PhD, remarks that the lab report “actually says that there IS DU in the sample. There should be zero. It is irrelevant that it is ‘not significant.’” Dr. Bertell — who has been honored by the U.N.as a statisticisn, epidemiologist, and member of the Science Advisory Board, International Joint Commission of the U. S. and Canada — goes on to say: “What you really want to know is whether or not the uranium found in the sample has been fired. This means electron spectroscopy.” Dr. Pang is also skeptical about the term “statiscally insignificant.” He claims that the laboratory’s reading of 1/100 DU, allowing for a measurement error of 1%, could mean the presence of 2% DU in the sample instead of its “zero” interpretation.

Dr. Lorrin Pang, MD, MPH, comments: “it is hard to do statistics with a sample of one,” referring to the single dustpan sample depicted on the front page of the newspaper’s July 22 issue. Dr. Pang, speaking as private citizen, is retired from the Army Medical Corps, is on the Best Doctors of America list 2006-8, and a consultant to the World Health organization (WHO) since 1985. Russell Takata, state radiation chief, is also on record as questioning WRHOA’s methodology.

To label tests a “bust” and conclude that “preliminary results find no health hazard” is simply not supported by fact. Closer to the truth is that we have been told little or nothing about whatever tests may have been conducted by the state or federal governments. Mr Takata refers to “preliminary reviews of about 90% of test results” but gives no data. What about the other 10%? The Army allegedly tested 800 dust samples, but these results have yet to be made available to the state or the public. All of this adds up to sweeping claims of safety, while providing no hard data to back them up. This has been a repeated pattern over the past several years: claims but no data.

The Hawaii County Council by a vote of 8-1 on July 2nd, passed resolution 639-08, calling for the halting of all live-fire that could spread military radiation and independent, comprehensive, testing

We heart Kealoha Pisciotta and we’re excited to have her in town! We’ll be talking story and sharing `awa at StudioBe in Chinatown with Kealoha on July 25, 2008.

She’ll be speaking and screening excerpts from Mauna Kea: Temple Under Siege, a film by Na Maka o ka `Aina. We’ll be talking with Kealoha about her experiences and activism in protecting of the sacred summit of Mauna Kea from development. Today, the IFA and a consortium of international institutions has a multi-million dollar proposal to build the largest telescope in the world on the last pristine plateau of Mauna Kea.

`Awa Circle + Talk Story: Sacred Landscapes
Friday, July 25, 2008
7PM to whenever pau
at StudioBe
corner of Beretania + Smith
63 N. Beretania St., 2nd Floor

A Hilo girl, cultural practitioner and former telescope tech, Kealoha’s tireless activism has helped to protect Mauna Kea’s sacred summit from unmitigated telescope development. She is the president of Mauna Kea Anaina Hou.

Mauna Kea, on the island of Hawai’i, is sacred as an elder ancestor and kinolau (physical embodiment) of spiritual deities. The summit area is also ecologically unique, and home the endemic weiku bug, which feeds on insects blown to the summit by updrafts.

Today, thirteen telescopes and support facilities crowd the sacred landscape of Mauna Kea. Even after 30 years of community opposition, a consortium of institutions led by the UH Institute for Astronomy (IFA) continues to propose new telescope construction. Today, over 1,000 individuals regularly drive to telescopes on the summit, leaving behind some 500,000 gallons of human waste toxic chemicals such as ethylene glycol and liquid mercury over the Big Island’s only aquifer.

13 of the richest nations in the world currently pay only $1 per year for their use of the sacred summit.

Construction has damaged and leveled the peaks, spewing dust and facilitating human intrusion that is wreaking havoc on this fragile and unique Hawaiian ecosystem. These impacts, coupled with the introduction of invasive predatory arthropods, are decimating populations of the wekiu bug, one of 11 endemic and imperiled species that call the mountain home.

“If we say yes to more development, we are saying yes to the desecration of our temple and our ancestors, yes to the destruction of our waters, and yes to the possible extinction of life itself.” – Kealoha Pisciotta

We shudder to think. We know that Olelo public access is an incredibly important non-commercial resource for information, discussion, expression and community connections on Oahu.

Olelo was created as part of an agreement between DCCA and Oceanic cable in 1989. In return for a cable franchise on Oahu, Oceanic agreed to provided PEG (public access) cable services through Olelo.

The Oceanic franchise expires at the end of this year, which means its re-negotiation time. Think Oceanic is going to continue their public access requirement without a demanding public? Think again.

The increasing trend with cable corporations is to eliminate funding for access services. The very existence of Olelo is at stake!

Hearing on the future of Olelo Tomorrow: Tuesday, July 15 from 4PM to 6:30PM at McKinley High, Hirata Hall. (Hirata Hall is best accessed from Pensacola, midway between King and Kapiolani. Parking is to the immediate right as you turn into the campus from Pensacola.)

From the guys at Olelo:

Thank you so much for spreading the word and for your encouraging responses. It is our understanding that except for a short opening PowerPoint presentation, the majority of the meeting will be devoted to public comment. Be sure to sign in, and if you plan to speak, check the appropriate box on the sign-in sheet.

We also understand that two questionnaires will be passed out. One will deal with the current quality and adequacy of cable service. The other may focus on ‘Olelo’s role. The information on our website, http://www.olelo.org/news_franchise_renewal.htm may help you prepare your written comments.

Written comments will be accepted through July 31.

Thank you again for all of your support. I look forward to seeing you at this important meeting on July 15.

Mahalo,

Keali`i S. Lopez
President and CEO
‘Olelo Community Television

Our friends at Malama Kaua`i, today on the radio:

Join hosts Andrea Brower and Keone Kealoha as we discuss the sources of our food and how it gets into our kitchens with author Ann Vileisis joining us by phone. Ann has written an extraordinary book on the last 200 years of food history in the United States, titled Kitchen Literacy. She starts with a simple meal and its context from 1796 and leads us through the next 200 years of change. She illuminates the impact of urbanization, immigration, industrialization (both in the larger sense and in the context of food systems). . KKCR can be found at 91.9 FM or online at www.KKCR.org.

Evan is our rock star summer intern here at KAHEA, a UH Law Student, and Fellow with the Center for Excellence in Native Hawaiian Law. He has spent much of the last month combing the 1,200 page draft plan for the future of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands–some of the last intact Hawaiian coral reef on the planet. He has been working along with experts in resource management, science and cultural practice to review, analyze and develop our detailed comments on the draft plan.

From his commentary in the Honolulu Advertiser:

After a two-year multi-agency effort, the public had only 75 days to muster up comments on the four-volume draft. Tomorrow is the deadline [the deadline was recently extended 15 days to July 23] thus far, we have simply not heard from the people.

Among the greatest concerns in the current draft is the abandonment of the “precautionary principle,” which requires biological, cultural and historic resource protection and integrity to be favored when there is a lack of information regarding the potential impacts of any activity.

After the public spoke clearly about their desire to maintain this fragile ocean wilderness as a pu’uhonua (forever sanctuary), this principle was firmly embedded into the presidential proclamation that established the monument.

Instead, this “do no harm” mandate was watered down and replaced with research plans of a questionable nature and vamped-up visitor plans. Even more important, the people have been stripped from the process.

The draft plan fails to mention retaining a public oversight committee. The Reserve Advisory Council played a pivotal role in providing public oversight in the creation of the monument, yet any similar entity has been eliminated.

Other areas where notable improvements can be made include: the need for Native Hawaiian involvement in the leadership and management of the monument; revisions to the permitting process, including renewal and enforcement; prioritizing research around critical conservation needs; the absence of an effective cumulative impact analysis, excessive ecotourism and visitor plans on Midway; and an incomplete and largely unsubstantiated cultural impact assessment.

With time running out, I urge you to visit www.kahea.org to see some of the major concerns that have been outlined by citizens, scientists, environmental advocates and Native Hawaiians who have been diligently parsing the draft proposal.

Thanks to your strong requests for additional time, government managers have granted an extra 15-days for public comment–moving the final deadline for comments to July 23. It ain’t much, but it is something.

If you’re a member of the KAHEA Action Alert Network, you’ve been seeing alerts on protecting the future of the pristine coral reefs of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (also known as the NWHI)… for about a month now.

We’re taking our extra 15 days, and along with thousands of others around the world, we’re asking for a better, stronger management plan. This plan spells out how the NWHI will be protected for the next 15 years.

So we’ll say it again! Without a better plan, we will be opening the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands to :
- Expanded military activities with NO mitigations
- Increased extractive research with NO protection from bioprospecting
- Increased development footprint, and more construction
- Increased vessel traffic
- Cruise ships and increases in permitted tourism

You can support by submitting your own written comments, signing our petition, and spreading the word. Mahalo piha to the thousands who have already supported the call for a better plan!

The military finally admitted in 2006 that depleted uranium (DU) spotting rounds for the Davy Crockett nuclear weapon system have been used at Schofield Barracks, the Pohakuloa Training Area, and possibly Makua Valley between 1962 and 1968.

The Army long denied ever using DU in Hawai‘i; reassuring residents in countless public hearings and environmental impact statements that “a records search for depleted uranium rounds was conducted and determined that these types of munitions were never part of the Army’s inventory in Hawai‘i… .”

The U.S. military has an obligation to be candid with the public about its activities in Hawaii because they have far-reaching implications for our health and welfare. The people of Hawaii will be left to suffer the consequences of U.S. military activities long after they have moved on to other fronts. That is why we must be vigilant and demand answers to our questions: Have other DU spotting rounds and the more hazardous DU armor penetrating rounds been used as well? What don’t we know about existing military contamination? What should we know before we even begin to consider pending expansion of live fire activities?

From friends on the Big Island:
The Hawaii County Council will be hearing Resolution 639-08 Urging the U.S. Military to address the hazards of depleted uranium (DU) at the Pohakuloa Training Area (PTA). The hearing is set for Wednesday, July 2nd 8:30 AM at the Council room on the 2nd floor of the Hilo Ben Franklin building.

You can support by submitting this letter to all Hawaii County council members, urging their support of resolution 639-08.

A growing number of people feel it is time to stop all live-fire and shut down PTA and get to the root of the problem. Stopping all live-fire at PTA is a key public safety and environmental conservation issue. Any live-fire training increases the risk of spreading the radiation contamination. There needs to be a thorough independent assessment and clean-up of the existing contamination before live-fire training can even be considered!

Unfortunately, Council Chair Pete Hoffmann has already prepared an amendment to delete the call for a complete halt to all live firing at PTA which is the heart of the matter. Don’t let this happen!

“… Just as smoking affects the primary user as well as those inhaling second hand smoke, the airborne products of DU burning remain suspended for long periods and travel great distances in the atmosphere. We do not know all the toxicity of the airborne DU products (nano-toxicity) but some forms (DU oxides) we do know can persist in the body for decades. When internalized DU emits the most dangerous type of radiation, alpha radiation. Animals with implanted alpha emitters have shown high cancer rates and birth defects – which can pass on to subsequent, UNEXPOSED generations.

- Lorrin Pang, MD, MPH (speaking as a private citizen). Dr. Pang was born and raised in Hawaii, and is Retired Army Medical Corp, Best Doctors of America list 2006-8, Consultant to the World Health organization (WHO) since 1986, Consultant Glaxo Smith Kline