New Evidence Suggests the US Navy Continues to Poison Oʻahu Residents Months After Declaring the Water Safe

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Wednesday, August 3, 2022

Press Contacts:

Healani Sonoda-Pale 808-372-2512

Gina Hara 808-941-2154

New data was released the morning of August 2, 2022 by the University of Hawaiʻi Red Hill Task Force that show “potential detection of fuel chemicals in samples collected from the Navy water supply.” This comes as a shock months after the Department of Health and the US Navy declared the water safe to drink.  A few hours after being posted, the UH Red Hill Task Force dashboard and data were taken down.  

This new data posted on Tuesday confirmed what residents and military ʻohana have been testifying about in recent hearings and raises questions about why UH is withholding information critical to protecting Oʻahu’s drinking water and public safety.  

Oʻahu Water Protector, Dani Espiritu states, “It’s not a secret that the US military provides significant funding to the University of Hawaiʻi. It seems like UH is being pressured by the US Navy to withdraw and suppress the science because the data contradicts the Navy’s claims that the water is safe. This only deepens public distrust.”

The Oʻahu Water Protectors demand that the University of Hawaiʻi immediately re-release the full results of the Red Hill Task Force water study. The public deserves to see the entire, unabridged study from the Red Hill Task Force in order to understand the level of contamination impacting human health and the environment as well as to assess the Navy’s ability to steward the water of our island.

The University of Hawaiʻi must understand that releasing the full results immediately is vital to the maintenance of public trust. In order for the people of Hawaiʻi to believe that this public university serves the people and the community that surrounds it, rather than U.S. military interests, honesty and transparency about our most vital public resource, water, is crucial. It is the duty of state entities to serve the people of Hawaiʻi, not provide cover for the Navy’s dishonesty and harms.

The Oʻahu Water Protectors will not settle for half-truths or obfuscation. Honesty and transparency about the water we drink, and the health of our people and our island are not negotiable. We need continued testing, and for the information about that testing to be released promptly, without delay or deception.

Nothing is more important than our water, and the health of the land and the people, which is inherently connected with the water of our aquifer. There is no substitute for clean drinking water. Water is life. Ola i ka wai.