The fish are poisoned with PFAS in Maryland’s Piscataway Creek and Potomac River
Joint Base Andrews contaminates the region.
By Pat Elder
March 10, 2023
Fishing at the Piscataway National Park, across from George Washington’s Mount Vernon. “We fry it up.”
I talked to this man when several of us visited the Piscataway National Park in late February 2023. He seemed content to be fishing. A lot of us are that way. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him the fish are poisoned.
The Maryland Department of the Environment reported that the filet of a Largemouth Bass taken from the tidal portion of Piscataway Creek contained 94,200 parts per trillion (ppt) of PFOS. (Per Fluoro Octane Sulfonic acid.)
PFOS is a type of PFAS. It is a grave threat to human health that is not being regulated in the fish that people consume, especially self-caught fish from local waters, both fresh and salt.
The EPA has issued an advisory to drinking water suppliers and the public that says PFOS ought to be kept under .02 part per trillion in the water we drink. The PFOS is 4.71 million times higher in the fish than the water advisory. The EPA is reprehensible for not enforcing these scientifically-driven limits. They are fraudulent. They’re not protecting anything but their corporate sponsors.
PFOS - Per Fluoro Octane Sulfonic acid
PFOS causes cancer. In the tiniest concentrations it has a disastrous effect on fetal development. It’s horrible!
It causes high cholesterol levels, changes to liver function, changes in thyroid hormone levels, and reduced immune response to disease. It’s deadly!
This is a great human health crisis.
PFOS may travel 20 miles or further in water. The compound is bio accumulative in fish, animals, and humans - and it never breaks down. Bioaccumulation rates in fish vary from several hundred to several thousand times the ambient water levels. If a body of water has 10 parts per trillion of PFOS, then fish may be expected to have between several hundred to tens of thousands or more parts per trillion in the filet, depending upon a host of conditions.
The tidal portion of Piscataway Creek is about 10 miles downstream from the source in the creek on Joint Base Andrews near the burn pits that were used for many years to test firefighting foams that were full of PFAS chemicals. The fire pits and contaminated soils at the Home of Air Force One perpetually belch out dangerous levels of PFAS into Piscataway Creek.
The source of Piscataway Creek is located at the runway on J.B. Andrews. The burn pit by the red X is 2,000 feet from the creek. The creek empties into the Potomac River at the historical capital of the Piscataway Nation.
We can’t fight the DOD and expect to win. They hold too many cards. The Air Force is going to do whatever the hell it wants to do, and the feds will look the other way. The best strategy for activists is to pressure state agencies to demand the military takes responsibility for its environmental crimes.
In Maryland, the Department of Health and the Department of the Environment aren’t comfortable calling out the 800-pound gorilla in the room. We must help to make them feel more comfortable. We must pressure the new Democratic Wes Moore administration to take steps to protect public health from PFOS in seafood and wildlife. It’s the same across the country and pretty much wherever US bases are located. We’re being poisoned and we’re not being protected.
Piscataway Creek as it leaves JB Andrews. Notice the yellow chemical boom. We tested the water at this spot and found the presence of 21 separate PFAS compounds totaling 2,781.8 parts per trillion.
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“If we are going to live so intimately with these chemicals, eating and drinking them, taking them into the very marrow of our bones - we had better know something about their nature and their power.”
― Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 1962.
Examine the two charts below showing the concentration of PFAS compounds in non-tidal Piscataway Creek near the base and the tidal portion of Piscataway Creek close to the Potomac River. Note the concentrations of the various compounds.
PFAS compounds in non-tidal Piscataway Creek
at the boundary of Joint Base Andrews - Cyclopure
PFAS Compounds - the tidal portion
of Piscataway Creek - Cyclopure
The Maryland Department of the Environment also tested the water in the creek near the perimeter of the base and in the tidal portion. See the comparison with our results.
PFOA
The creek water near the base totaled 237.9 ppt of PFOA while the sample from the tidal water showed 19.9 ppt. PFOS is a greater threat in fish than PFOA, although PFOA is considered to be deadlier than PFOS in drinking water.
PFOA was found at a concentration of 435,000 ppt in groundwater at JB Andrews. The advisory set by the EPA is .004 ppt in groundwater, so the water here is 108.75 million times over that level. The DOD and the EPA aren’t concerned about it, though. Hakuna matata!
Other PFAS compounds also bioaccumulate, but we’re just looking at the PFOS here because the EPA set an advisory for it in drinking water. It provides us with a marker.
Our Largemouth Bass contained 94,200 ppt of PFOS while the water had 74 ppt. The levels of PFOS in the fish were 1,273 times greater than the levels in the water. This is how it works.
This is just a snapshot. Fish move around and there are many places along the Potomac where PFAS is emptying into the river. For instance, the Army’s Fort Belvoir is right across the Potomac, just south of Mount Vernon. The base has a long history of PFAS use in training firefighters and has several overhead suppression systems in hangars loaded with aqueous film-forming foam, (AFFF). Engine cleaning and chrome plating performed on base likely used PFAS. Our Largemouth Bass doesn’t stand a chance. Because Belvior is an Army facility, we don’t have results of the PFAS contamination.
The Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) recommends that adults and children should consume no more than 1 meal per month of Redbreast Sunfish from the affected area. MDE also recommends consumption of no more than 7 meals per month (for children only) of Yellow Bullhead Catfish. Finally, MDE recommends that adults should limit their consumption of Largemouth Bass to three 8-ounce servings per month, and children should be limited to 2 meals per month.
The regulations are nonsense. PFOS is known to interfere with fetal development, especially in the first trimester. The state must do a better job protecting the public.
The Piscataway Creek fish advisory only applies to fish inside the half-mile wide mouth of the creek. Fish in the Potomac heading over to Fort Belvoir aren’t covered by the advisory, which no one knows about anyway.
Piscataway Creek is shown in blue, running from Joint Base Andrews to the Potomac River.
The red dot shows the mouth of the creek where it empties into the Potomac. A Largemouth Bass was found to contain 94,200 ppt of PFOS here. Source: MDE. George Washington’s Mount Vernon is shown across the river. Washington, DC is 6 miles north. Further down the river, the crabs, oysters, and rockfish are also contaminated with these dreadful chemicals from other military sources.
Nontidal Redbreast Sunfish 359,000 ppt. of PFOS.
Little fishes get eaten by big fishes.
A Largemouth Bass contained 94,200 ppt of PFOS in its filet. It is a favorite sport fish for charter fishing boats. Sunfish is their prey of choice.
Several folks who live near Joint Base Andrews in Maryland have tested their water supplied by the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission and report the total PFAS levels in their drinking water in the low single digits. It’s bad, but it’s miniscule compared to the fish.
Piscataway Creek PFAS Sampling Project –
Water and Fish Tissue Sampling Results
ng/l = nanograms per liter (liquid) = 1 part per trillion.
ng/g = nanograms per gram (solid) = 1,000 parts per trillion
The concentrations of total PFAS carcinogens in Piscataway Creek diminish as the creek flows toward the Potomac. This is happening across the country.
The chemicals become part of the sediment and the soil to wreak havoc on future generations, like a giant, squishy, subterranean sponge. When the creek floods, the carcinogens coat the banks. When water levels recede, and the poisonous sediment bakes in the sun. It turns to dust and is lifted by the wind to settle in our lungs and in our homes as carcinogenic dust.
Wear a mask while sweeping and vacuuming if you’re close to a military base.
Washington is 6 miles north of Piscataway Creek. George Washington’s Mount Vernon is on the Virginia side of the river. Joint Base Andrews is located about 10 miles up Piscataway Creek. This area was the center of the Piscataway Indian nation that preceded the arrival of Maryland’s first settlers. In March of 1634 colonists from England met the Piscataway Chief (Tayac) where the poisoned waters of Piscataway Creek flow into the Potomac today.
Woman with a Largemouth Bass.
The National Park Service encourages the public to use the fishing pier at the National Colonial Farm on the Potomac River. There are no signs saying the fish are toxic. The public is clueless while park officials are intent on keeping it this way.
The MDE says there is not enough data to apply the PFAS advisory to the much larger Potomac River - 301 Bridge to the DC line area. The MDE is responsible for generating the data. It is making excuses for its lack of attention to this pressing public health crisis.
The MDE only publicized results for three varieties of PFAS: PFOS, PFOA, and PFBS. Commercial labs often report 55 compounds and they’re all thought to be harmful.
The financial support we receive from the Downs Law Group makes this work possible.
The firm is working to provide legal representation to individuals with a high likelihood of exposure to PFAS and other contaminants.
Interested in joining a multi-base class action law suit pertaining to illnesses stemming from various kinds of environmental contamination? Join the Veterans & Civilians Clean Water Alliance
Facebook group. (2.2 K members and growing rapidly.)