PFAS in sewer water at Brunswick, Maine’s Hangar 6 threaten the region
By Pat Elder
February 14, 2025
The Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority and Maine’s state government continue to allow the presence of thousands of gallons of deadly PFAS foam concentrate in Hangars 5 and 6 at Brunswick Landing.
They are threatening public health with their negligence.
The Navy removed the remaining foam from Hangar 4 not too long after the disastrous spill of 1,450 gallons of concentrate on August 19, 2024. They knew they had to act quickly, and they’ve done a marvelous job staying out of the headlines. Meanwhile, state officials have been slow to accept responsibility for the other two hangars, allowing for further catastrophe.
The federal government is not coming to the rescue. We know this from a hundred accidents like this across the country. This is Maine’s problem. Maine Rep. Dan Ankeles (D-Brunswick) understands the threat. Why don’t more people in Maine?
Pandora was told not to open the box and now she can’t close it.
Ed Friedman with Friends of Merrymeeting Bay, says, “Hangar 6 remains a ticking, leaking time bomb.” His testing of sewer water at Hangar 6 demonstrates the calamity. The group accessed the sewer separator pits through the Brunswick Sewer District’s request of Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority. It’s good to see the cooperation at this level.
Regular consumption of one-tenth of one part per trillion of PFOA, one deadly variety of PFAS, is associated with higher incidences of pancreatic cancer. PFAS affect the thyroid, making us more susceptible to disease. They are very powerful.
The numbers shown are in parts per trillion. The sewer water contained 56,508.9 parts per trillion of 39 PFAS compounds. Sure, no one drinks sewer water, but it is making us sick in other ways. It is poisoning the entire food chain, perhaps forever. It is poisoning seafood, and it is coating the banks of our rivers and streams. It dries and it is lifted by the wind into the air to settle in in our lungs and our homes as dust.
The contamination complements the existing toxic stew of soil, air, and water on the former Brunswick Naval Air Station, one of the nation’s most dangerous Superfund sites. Barium, Cadmium, DDT, Dioxin, Lead, Mercury, Methylene Chloride, Tetrachloroethylene (PCE), Trichloroethylene (TCE), and Vinyl Chloride are all found at dangerous levels at Brunswick.
Maine regulates 6 PFAS compounds in drinking water by keeping them under 20 parts per trillion (alone or in combination). See the totals in Brunswick’s sewer, draining into the Androscoggin River.
These chemicals are in our lobsters, our mussels, our milk and eggs. Almost all of the PFAS in our bodies is from eating contaminated food. The Brunswick-Topsham Water District says our public drinking water is not impacted by PFAS, and we have no reason to doubt them. Almost all of the PFAS in our bodies is from the food we eat and the air we breathe.
The town does not remove the carcinogens from water. The poisons flow into the Androscoggin River. It’s an environmental catastrophe. The more you read about PFAS, the more likely you’ll be awestruck by their power and omnipresence. They just don’t go away.
There’s a disconnect in public relations.
Maine’s Department of Environmental Protection could do a much better job explaining this public health emergency, especially concerning the poisoned fish. Consider this from their Update 14 on the Brunswick spill. “Concentrations of PFOS in Merriconeag Stream fish ranged from 528 to 4,687 ng/g.” This doesn’t mean anything to the public! Ng/g is nanograms per gram, or parts per billion, so we have to multiply by a thousand to get to parts per trillion so people will have a basis for comparison. Many residents know that the state, to its credit, is trying to keep 6 types of PFAS compounds under 20 parts per trillion in drinking water.
Instead of saying “fish ranged from 528 to 4,687 ng/g for PFOS,” they ought to say, “fish ranged from 528,000 parts per trillion to 4,687,000 parts per trillion of PFOS.” They could make it very clear by adding that the EPA under President Biden had sought to keep PFOS under 4 parts per trillion in drinking water. They should also point out that testing labs will typically report on several dozen PFAS compounds in fish and that PFOS may account for less than half the total in some fish. They might add that the EPA says PFOS may accumulate in some species at a level that is up to 4,000 times the concentrations in the water. Finally, and most importantly, they should warn women who are pregnant or may become pregnant that they should not consume fish from the region unless it has been tested for the carcinogens. They should tell everybody else that, too.
A closer look at some PFAS compounds in the sewer water
The Hangar 6 sewer drain’s water contained 20,978 ppt of 6:2 FTS. That is 6:2 Fluoro telomer sulfonic acid. Shortly after 2010 or so, 6:2 FTS began replacing PFOS in applications like chrome plating and fire-fighting foams. It isn’t as bad PFOS, but it is still a danger. Are there chrome plating facilities active in the hangar?
PFHxA (1,737.7 ppt) and PFBA (202.4 ppt) are known to lift as vapors from soil, providing another pathway to human ingestion. PFHxA is linked to liver disorders. PFBA has been associated with severe COVID-19 outcomes.
PFHxS (5,190.5 ppt) is associated with Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity and Autism Spectrum Disorder.
PFOS (11,277.4 ppt) and PFOA (1,017.5 ppt) are proven human carcinogens. Between them, they are associated with more than 100 separate diseases and cancers.
The high concentration of PFOS from the recent Hangar 6 sewer is a mystery. Hangar 6 was built in 2006, after PFOS was phased out. It is likely the Navy used foams at that point that didn’t include PFOS. One theory is that after a leak involving 2,000 gallons of concentrate in 2012, MRRA officials added old PFAS concentrate they had on hand that contained PFOS. Unlike several states, Maine does not have a central system for buying back and collecting AFFF from around the state.
Another explanation for the existence of PFOS in the Hangar 6 leak is that many PFAS compounds, particularly precursor chemicals, can break down or transform into PFOS through processes like biodegradation. It’s like adding letters while playing scrabble.
Introducing N-AP-FHxSA (8,105 ppt) Molecular formula – C6 F13 SO2 NHCH2 CH2 CH2 N(CH3)2
Known as: N-[3-(Dimethylamino)propyl]-1,1,2,2,3,3,4,4,5,5,6,6,6-tridecafluoro-1-hexanesulfonamide.
The National Institutes of Health does not supply information on the associated diseases or disorders of this compound and the EPA does not regulate it.
The European Chemicals Agency says this foam ingredient is “…likely to meet criteria for category 1A or 1B carcinogenicity, mutagenicity, or reproductive toxicity…”
Mutagenicity is the ability of a substance to cause permanent changes to an organism's DNA. These mutations can affect a single gene, a group of genes, or chromosomes. Reproductive toxicity affects fertility, pregnancy outcomes, and the healthy development of the fetus. Is it too far off the mark to suggest that PFAS may be an existential threat to humanity?
If you live in Brunswick, PFAS is in your blood. If you live anywhere, it’s in your blood because of places like Brunswick.
Let’s take a look at the concentrations of various PFAS compounds from the Hangar 4 disaster. They were conveniently provided by the testing lab in parts per trillion. They should have placed commas in the totals!
PFAS Totals from the Hangar 4 Disaster - in parts per trillion
This chart shows the levels of PFAS compounds released into Brunswick’s environment from Hangar 4 on August 19, 2024. These are the highest levels recorded anywhere on earth for these compounds. PFOS alone had a concentration of 3.78 billion parts per trillion, meaning this may haunt Brunswick for a thousand years.
In 2012, about 2,000 gallons of Ansulite AFFF concentrate spilled from the Hangar 6 storage tank. This spill was 38% larger than the recent accident, but they kept it pretty quiet. We see this across the country. Who knew?
Apparently, MRRA employees had broken a valve in Hanger 6 in 2012 that dumped about 2,000 gallons of concentrate down the sewer lines before it was noticed. This may have been the greatest environmental calamity in Maine’s history. It’s the same in Japan and Germany. It’s like this in California and Hawaii, too. There’s little historical analysis. Dots are connected after it’s too late to shape events, while few are paying attention.
All residents of Brunswick Landing are supposed to be given notice that they may be exposed to various disease-causing agents, yet some say they’ve never received such notification. These are called Land Use Controls, or LUCs. They are used to provide notice that the land was contaminated by the Navy, and they spell out restrictions on land use. Should children be playing in the dirt in the back yard? Should dogs be drinking from puddles? Should birds?
The Fallacy of PFAS clean up
The local press has mentioned or parroted the term “clean up” hundreds of times since Brunswick’s day of infamy.
Consider the logistics of “cleaning up” the water, the muddy banks, and the sediment of PFAS. It would be a massive project involving Mare Brook and its main tributary, Merriconeag Stream which empties into Picnic Pond, along with Ponds A, B, and C that also flow into Picnic Pond. Mare Brook alone is 5.7 miles long.
How many millions of cubic yards of contaminated sediment must be removed and what do we do with it? How many tens of thousands of loads of dump trucks will be necessary for these ponds and streams and where would we send it? We can’t landfill it. We can’t spread it on farms, and we can’t incinerate it. Some PFAS compounds can travel in groundwater and surface water for many miles.
PFAS contamination cannot be effectively cleaned up through traditional remediation methods. This is not an oil spill!
We must be mindful of the hundreds of products and applications in use at airports and industrial sites that contain PFAS. The landfills and wastewater plants don’t treat the chemicals. They just act like toll booths that send them on their way to havoc.
Was there really “a leak” at Hangar 6?
These arguments have played out in many places where these accident-prone AFFF suppression systems are deployed. Officials in Brunswick say there was no leak at Hangar 6. Bowdoin College Professor of Biology and Biochemistry Emeritus, David S. Page said, “It’s not notleaking.” Gotta love it!
PFAS can’t leak from the hangars if it’s not there. Maine must get these disease-causing chemicals away from vulnerable people! What’s the hold up?
I want to raise money to perform environmental testing in Brunswick, Maine, Fort Ord, California, and Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii. Please help us do this. Send me an email, pelder@militarypoisons.org about what you would like tested and where. Click the button below to send a contribution.