An investigative study needs to be conducted into the thousands of Exxon Valdez Oil Spill (EVOS) workers'
health issues, and acknowledged as Exxon's criminal actions; not just as Exxon's Collateral Damage.
This letter is released in the hope of informing the media, public, and anyone who is concerned about human
interest stories relating to how Exxon authorized the toxic chemicals for spraying oily beaches. Exxon has been
fighting an Alaska jury's verdict for 14 years, contending that the $3.5 billion it already has spent following
the worst oil spill in U.S. history is enough. The Alaska jury initially awarded $5 billion to 33,000 commercial
fishermen, Native Alaskans, landowners,businesses and local governments, but a federal appeals court cut the
verdict in half. Nothing has been paid.
After ninteen years, and deliberating for four months, on Jun 25, 2008 the US Supreme Court Justices announced
their decision. They cut the punitive damages yet again. When that amount is divided by Alaska's plaintiffs' lives
that were destroyed by the oil spill; is $15,000 the Supreme Court's price of life? Exxon has still not accepted
full responsibility for the tragic EVOS alleged, cleanup of 1989. Yet Exxon continues to boast of profits each
year and lead other oil companies in raising prices at the gasoline pumps.
Here is the rest of the story: In 1989 while media and public attention focused on the thousands of oil-coated
and dead seabirds, otters, and other wildlife, little attention was given to the harm done to the cleanup workers.
As workers blasted oiled beaches with hot seawater from high pressure hoses, they were engulfed in toxic fumes,
containing aerosolized crude oil—benzene, and other volatile compounds, oil mist, and polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons. (view photos at: http://www.silenceinthesound.com/gallery.shtml)
It is an extreme concern that the cleanup workers from the 1989 EVOS are suffering from long-term health problems
resulting from toxic chemical exposures. A significant number of the workers have died. Some of the illnesses
include neurological impairment, chronic respiratory disease, leukemia, lymphoma, brain tumors, liver damage,
and blood diseases. View stories at: (www.silenceinthesound.com/stories.shtml)
Dr. Riki Ott has written two books; Sound Truth & Corporate Myth$,The Legacy of the Exxon valdez Oil Spill;
and Not One Drop. (www.soundtruth.info). Dr. Riki Ott has investigated, studied the oil spill spraying, and
quotes numerous reports on the toxic chemicals used during the 1989 Prince William Sound oily beach cleanup
in her books. For more information contact: Riki Ott, PhD, email: info@soundtruth.info).
Merle (Bailey) Savage, General Foreman during the (EVOS) cleanup attempt of 1989. (msavage12@cox.net).
