Manufacturer 3M warned over chemicals at quarry
The chemical conglomerate behind Post-it notes and Scotch-Brite has been handed a yellow card over "significant contamination" from historic toxic chemicals found in a quarry it leased.
PFAS soil, sediment, groundwater and surface water have been found across a 100-hectare area of the inactive Brogans Creek lime quarry northwest of the Blue Mountains, the NSW Environment Protection Authority says.
The authority has for the first time issued a clean-up notice and took regulatory action against 3M and its local Australian arm.
"This is a significant moment for the EPA and one that represents an important milestone in our efforts to address legacy environmental harm," Operations Director David Gathercole said.
"Though this is only the first step ... 3M has so far been co-operative voluntarily offering to conduct investigation to better understand the extent and legacy of PFAS contamination."
PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a group of 15,000 highly toxic, synthetic chemicals used for their resistance to heat, stains and grease.
They have been dubbed "forever chemicals" because they break down extremely slowly.
Emerging evidence has linked some PFAS substances to cancer, leading to tighter regulation of the substances, particularly in drinking water.
The quarry, in the state's central west, was historically used by 3M to test PFAS-containing firefighting foam.
The authority said while "the scale of the onsite contamination is significant", there is limited human exposure because of the remoteness of the site.
However, it found some of the chemicals eight kilometres downstream in the Capertee River within a national park.
They were considered to be above the national drinking guidelines.
A sign has been erected warning park users to not drink river water. But recreational use including swimming remains safe, the authority said.
Under the clean-up notice, 3M Australia has 60 days to submit a detailed plan to manage PFAS pollution.
The company has been contacted for a comment.
The chemical conglomerate behind Post-it notes and Scotch-Brite has been handed a yellow card over "significant contamination" from historic toxic chemicals found in a quarry it leased.
PFAS soil, sediment, groundwater and surface water have been found across a 100-hectare area of the inactive Brogans Creek lime quarry northwest of the Blue Mountains, the NSW Environment Protection Authority says.
The authority has for the first time issued a clean-up notice and took regulatory action against 3M and its local Australian arm.
"This is a significant moment for the EPA and one that represents an important milestone in our efforts to address legacy environmental harm," Operations Director David Gathercole said.
"Though this is only the first step ... 3M has so far been co-operative voluntarily offering to conduct investigation to better understand the extent and legacy of PFAS contamination."
PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a group of 15,000 highly toxic, synthetic chemicals used for their resistance to heat, stains and grease.
They have been dubbed "forever chemicals" because they break down extremely slowly.
Emerging evidence has linked some PFAS substances to cancer, leading to tighter regulation of the substances, particularly in drinking water.
The quarry, in the state's central west, was historically used by 3M to test PFAS-containing firefighting foam.
The authority said while "the scale of the onsite contamination is significant", there is limited human exposure because of the remoteness of the site.
However, it found some of the chemicals eight kilometres downstream in the Capertee River within a national park.
They were considered to be above the national drinking guidelines.
A sign has been erected warning park users to not drink river water. But recreational use including swimming remains safe, the authority said.
Under the clean-up notice, 3M Australia has 60 days to submit a detailed plan to manage PFAS pollution.
The company has been contacted for a comment.
The chemical conglomerate behind Post-it notes and Scotch-Brite has been handed a yellow card over "significant contamination" from historic toxic chemicals found in a quarry it leased.
PFAS soil, sediment, groundwater and surface water have been found across a 100-hectare area of the inactive Brogans Creek lime quarry northwest of the Blue Mountains, the NSW Environment Protection Authority says.
The authority has for the first time issued a clean-up notice and took regulatory action against 3M and its local Australian arm.
"This is a significant moment for the EPA and one that represents an important milestone in our efforts to address legacy environmental harm," Operations Director David Gathercole said.
"Though this is only the first step ... 3M has so far been co-operative voluntarily offering to conduct investigation to better understand the extent and legacy of PFAS contamination."
PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a group of 15,000 highly toxic, synthetic chemicals used for their resistance to heat, stains and grease.
They have been dubbed "forever chemicals" because they break down extremely slowly.
Emerging evidence has linked some PFAS substances to cancer, leading to tighter regulation of the substances, particularly in drinking water.
The quarry, in the state's central west, was historically used by 3M to test PFAS-containing firefighting foam.
The authority said while "the scale of the onsite contamination is significant", there is limited human exposure because of the remoteness of the site.
However, it found some of the chemicals eight kilometres downstream in the Capertee River within a national park.
They were considered to be above the national drinking guidelines.
A sign has been erected warning park users to not drink river water. But recreational use including swimming remains safe, the authority said.
Under the clean-up notice, 3M Australia has 60 days to submit a detailed plan to manage PFAS pollution.
The company has been contacted for a comment.
The chemical conglomerate behind Post-it notes and Scotch-Brite has been handed a yellow card over "significant contamination" from historic toxic chemicals found in a quarry it leased.
PFAS soil, sediment, groundwater and surface water have been found across a 100-hectare area of the inactive Brogans Creek lime quarry northwest of the Blue Mountains, the NSW Environment Protection Authority says.
The authority has for the first time issued a clean-up notice and took regulatory action against 3M and its local Australian arm.
"This is a significant moment for the EPA and one that represents an important milestone in our efforts to address legacy environmental harm," Operations Director David Gathercole said.
"Though this is only the first step ... 3M has so far been co-operative voluntarily offering to conduct investigation to better understand the extent and legacy of PFAS contamination."
PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a group of 15,000 highly toxic, synthetic chemicals used for their resistance to heat, stains and grease.
They have been dubbed "forever chemicals" because they break down extremely slowly.
Emerging evidence has linked some PFAS substances to cancer, leading to tighter regulation of the substances, particularly in drinking water.
The quarry, in the state's central west, was historically used by 3M to test PFAS-containing firefighting foam.
The authority said while "the scale of the onsite contamination is significant", there is limited human exposure because of the remoteness of the site.
However, it found some of the chemicals eight kilometres downstream in the Capertee River within a national park.
They were considered to be above the national drinking guidelines.
A sign has been erected warning park users to not drink river water. But recreational use including swimming remains safe, the authority said.
Under the clean-up notice, 3M Australia has 60 days to submit a detailed plan to manage PFAS pollution.
The company has been contacted for a comment.
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The Age
a day ago
- The Age
New evidence unearthed of shocking Japanese assault of Australian nurses
In February 1942, when the evacuation vessel, Vyner Brooke, was sunk off the coast of Sumatra, survivors who had fled Singapore just before the island surrendered to Japanese forces, struggled ashore on Bangka Island. Among them were 53 Australian army nursing sisters. Two days later, 21 who made it to Radji Beach lay dead, machine-gunned by Japanese soldiers. The sole survivor of this infamous massacre was Sister Vivian Bullwinkel, who sustained a minor flesh wound just above her left hip. Feigning death, she floated in the water until it was safe to go into the nearby jungle, where she hid for some days, caring for a badly injured British soldier. Finally, the pair realised they had no option but to make their way to the closest town, where they gave themselves up. The soldier died of his injuries, but Vivian survived, the only person, apart from the Japanese, who knew precisely what happened on that isolated beach. The story she told for the rest of her life was one of noble courage, of nurses holding hands, calmly and silently marching into the sea, until cut down by machine gun fire. Fifty years after the event, many people interested in this wartime incident began questioning the veracity of Bullwinkel's account, as the Japanese responsible for the massacre were from the same unit that had raped and murdered British and Chinese nurses in Hong Kong. Japanese historian Yuki Tanaka was even brave enough to suggest that Vivian 'did not tell the truth' at the International Military Tribunal in 1946, to save her dead colleagues from 'the disgrace of being known as victims of rape'. It was not until 2019, building on forensic detective work by writer Barbara Angell and journalist Tess Lawrence, in whom Vivian had confided, that I amassed sufficient evidence, some of it from Vivian herself, revealed in my book Angels of Mercy, to show that the nurses had been raped before being killed, and that the scene on the beach had been horrific. Far from calm acceptance of their fate, the nurses had run for their lives, screaming, some only partially clad and at least one killed by a sword blow to the head. When The Sydney Morning Herald reported my 2019 findings when the book was released, there were naysayers who refused to believe it. They also refused to believe that Vivian had been gagged, although she had also told Lawrence that being forced to remain silent had caused her great emotional anguish. However, the article aroused international interest, and several people contacted me. A former employee of the (now) Department of Veterans' Affairs, revealed that Bullwinkel's files had been 'more closely guarded than the nuclear codes' because 'she had been raped by the Japanese on Bangka Island'. A female army officer reported that in the early 1990s, when chatting to Vivian about her forthcoming biography, published in 1999, she confided that her biographer was refusing to allow her to tell all the facts, to let the truth be known. When asked, 'Well, what is the truth?' Vivian replied, 'we were not just marched into the sea. We were raped and tortured, and then we were marched into the sea'. She told a similar story to a friend, a fellow ex-POW and a police officer, who had suffered terribly on the Burma-Thai railway. Despite her wish to have 'all the facts' revealed, Vivian, by now in failing health, was denied this right by her biographer, who had simply repeated the oft told, censored story. Seven months after publication, death silenced her forever. She died of a heart attack on July 3, 2000, aged 84. Determined to give her the voice she had been so long denied, I began an investigation to determine who had shut her down, and when. Loading The gagging had begun in 1945 with an order issued by Lord Mountbatten's South-east Asia command, forbidding any recovered prisoner of war from making any statement without military clearance. As soon as it was known that Australian nurses had been recovered from a prison camp in Sumatra, an Australian officer was dispatched to Singapore, where he prepared a statement that Vivian signed. It mirrored the sanitised version of the massacre which, by this time, had been published worldwide. The Australian military and government believed that the public should be shielded from the harsh realities of war, but determining who had silenced Vivian was going to be a challenge. However, blessed with a knowledge of how war crimes units operated, I took a punt and was rewarded when I came across a lengthy statement by Francis Hughes, a war crimes investigator. It was a gift from heaven – the missing piece, which vindicated everything Vivian had said. Hughes, who had served in a highly secret wartime unit, applied for service with 1 Australian War Crimes Section. Based in Singapore, his task was to sift through affidavits documenting atrocities to extract data for use by the prosecution. In due course, he came across one from Vivian, not the sanitised version of events but one given to war crimes investigators in which she stated all the facts. Horrified, he sought advice from his superiors who, on learning that the nurses had been subjected to rape that was 'continuous and shocking', decreed that the details should never be disclosed, out of consideration for their families and that no one, including Vivian, who knew the truth, must ever reveal it. Hughes remained tight-lipped for almost 60 years. It is amazing that, in the more than 20 years that his statement has been on the public record, no one noticed it. He also made a second statement, alluding to a cover-up, but that too passed unnoticed. Vivian's affidavit also confirmed that some nurses had been forced to act as comfort women. After reading her affidavit, Hughes reported, 'one knows exactly how they had been subject to indescribable conditions by Japanese officers who were using Dutch Club for this activity'. There is no doubt that Vivian Bullwinkel was not only brutally violated, she was forced to suffer in silence all her life by a succession of men who thought they knew best. She wanted a voice and I am privileged to give it to her. There are sure to be some who would prefer that such a story be left untold, but to continue to deliberately air brush events that are uncomfortable truths, serves no purpose but to subvert our wartime history. I like to get to the heart of the matter. All my books have uncovered a story that was not known before. Truth suppressed, facts buried, for many and varied reasons. The families of the nurses have a right to know. Vivian wanted them to know. To continue to deny the existence of an atrocity, hidden for so long, protects no one but the perpetrators.
Sydney Morning Herald
a day ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
New evidence unearthed of shocking Japanese assault of Australian nurses
In February 1942, when the evacuation vessel, Vyner Brooke, was sunk off the coast of Sumatra, survivors who had fled Singapore just before the island surrendered to Japanese forces, struggled ashore on Bangka Island. Among them were 53 Australian army nursing sisters. Two days later, 21 who made it to Radji Beach lay dead, machine-gunned by Japanese soldiers. The sole survivor of this infamous massacre was Sister Vivian Bullwinkel, who sustained a minor flesh wound just above her left hip. Feigning death, she floated in the water until it was safe to go into the nearby jungle, where she hid for some days, caring for a badly injured British soldier. Finally, the pair realised they had no option but to make their way to the closest town, where they gave themselves up. The soldier died of his injuries, but Vivian survived, the only person, apart from the Japanese, who knew precisely what happened on that isolated beach. The story she told for the rest of her life was one of noble courage, of nurses holding hands, calmly and silently marching into the sea, until cut down by machine gun fire. Fifty years after the event, many people interested in this wartime incident began questioning the veracity of Bullwinkel's account, as the Japanese responsible for the massacre were from the same unit that had raped and murdered British and Chinese nurses in Hong Kong. Japanese historian Yuki Tanaka was even brave enough to suggest that Vivian 'did not tell the truth' at the International Military Tribunal in 1946, to save her dead colleagues from 'the disgrace of being known as victims of rape'. It was not until 2019, building on forensic detective work by writer Barbara Angell and journalist Tess Lawrence, in whom Vivian had confided, that I amassed sufficient evidence, some of it from Vivian herself, revealed in my book Angels of Mercy, to show that the nurses had been raped before being killed, and that the scene on the beach had been horrific. Far from calm acceptance of their fate, the nurses had run for their lives, screaming, some only partially clad and at least one killed by a sword blow to the head. When The Sydney Morning Herald reported my 2019 findings when the book was released, there were naysayers who refused to believe it. They also refused to believe that Vivian had been gagged, although she had also told Lawrence that being forced to remain silent had caused her great emotional anguish. However, the article aroused international interest, and several people contacted me. A former employee of the (now) Department of Veterans' Affairs, revealed that Bullwinkel's files had been 'more closely guarded than the nuclear codes' because 'she had been raped by the Japanese on Bangka Island'. A female army officer reported that in the early 1990s, when chatting to Vivian about her forthcoming biography, published in 1999, she confided that her biographer was refusing to allow her to tell all the facts, to let the truth be known. When asked, 'Well, what is the truth?' Vivian replied, 'we were not just marched into the sea. We were raped and tortured, and then we were marched into the sea'. She told a similar story to a friend, a fellow ex-POW and a police officer, who had suffered terribly on the Burma-Thai railway. Despite her wish to have 'all the facts' revealed, Vivian, by now in failing health, was denied this right by her biographer, who had simply repeated the oft told, censored story. Seven months after publication, death silenced her forever. She died of a heart attack on July 3, 2000, aged 84. Determined to give her the voice she had been so long denied, I began an investigation to determine who had shut her down, and when. Loading The gagging had begun in 1945 with an order issued by Lord Mountbatten's South-east Asia command, forbidding any recovered prisoner of war from making any statement without military clearance. As soon as it was known that Australian nurses had been recovered from a prison camp in Sumatra, an Australian officer was dispatched to Singapore, where he prepared a statement that Vivian signed. It mirrored the sanitised version of the massacre which, by this time, had been published worldwide. The Australian military and government believed that the public should be shielded from the harsh realities of war, but determining who had silenced Vivian was going to be a challenge. However, blessed with a knowledge of how war crimes units operated, I took a punt and was rewarded when I came across a lengthy statement by Francis Hughes, a war crimes investigator. It was a gift from heaven – the missing piece, which vindicated everything Vivian had said. Hughes, who had served in a highly secret wartime unit, applied for service with 1 Australian War Crimes Section. Based in Singapore, his task was to sift through affidavits documenting atrocities to extract data for use by the prosecution. In due course, he came across one from Vivian, not the sanitised version of events but one given to war crimes investigators in which she stated all the facts. Horrified, he sought advice from his superiors who, on learning that the nurses had been subjected to rape that was 'continuous and shocking', decreed that the details should never be disclosed, out of consideration for their families and that no one, including Vivian, who knew the truth, must ever reveal it. Hughes remained tight-lipped for almost 60 years. It is amazing that, in the more than 20 years that his statement has been on the public record, no one noticed it. He also made a second statement, alluding to a cover-up, but that too passed unnoticed. Vivian's affidavit also confirmed that some nurses had been forced to act as comfort women. After reading her affidavit, Hughes reported, 'one knows exactly how they had been subject to indescribable conditions by Japanese officers who were using Dutch Club for this activity'. There is no doubt that Vivian Bullwinkel was not only brutally violated, she was forced to suffer in silence all her life by a succession of men who thought they knew best. She wanted a voice and I am privileged to give it to her. There are sure to be some who would prefer that such a story be left untold, but to continue to deliberately air brush events that are uncomfortable truths, serves no purpose but to subvert our wartime history. I like to get to the heart of the matter. All my books have uncovered a story that was not known before. Truth suppressed, facts buried, for many and varied reasons. The families of the nurses have a right to know. Vivian wanted them to know. To continue to deny the existence of an atrocity, hidden for so long, protects no one but the perpetrators.
West Australian
a day ago
- West Australian
Son of war hero, Jack Wong Sue, in search of rightful home for WWII prisoner of war ring
For 80 years it lay anonymously among dusty World War II memorabilia belonging to celebrated Australian soldier Jack Wong Sue. Now, an international search is under way to find the rightful home of the silver ring Sue gently slipped off the finger of a dead Allied serviceman in 1945. Sue and his comrades from the Z Special Unit, a precursor to the SAS and Commando regiments, had stumbled upon the cannibalised corpse of the prisoner of war while on patrol in Borneo late in the war. He pocketed the tarnished ring, bringing it home to Perth when Japan surrendered and he was discharged from service. Sue's son Barry is determined to find the family of the ring's owner so he can return it to them. It would be a needle-in-a-haystack mission were it not for two clues — inscriptions on the band and a small piece of dog-eared cloth. The words 'Iraq' and 'Egypt' are engraved on the ring, which Mr Sue believes could refer to theatres of war in which the soldier fought before being captured by the Japanese in South-East Asia. The cloth, which the POW appears to have wrapped around the band to wedge it onto his emaciated finger, could hold DNA. 'This is something I feel I need to do,' Mr Sue told The West Australian this week. 'It is something Dad would have wanted.' Jack Wong Sue was one of seven Australian special forces soldiers who were secreted into Japanese-occupied Borneo by an American submarine in March 1945. Surrounded by enemy troops, the Z Special commandos teamed up with local headhunting tribes to wreak havoc on the 3000 Japanese who were retreating across the island. Acting Sergeant Sue was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal for his bravery during the guerilla campaign, which often focused on trailing Allied soldiers on the infamous Sandakan death march. The body from which the ring was retrieved was on that notorious jungle track and Mr Sue believes his father referenced the incident in his memoir, Blood On Borneo. 'Spread-eagled, each hand and foot was tied to a stake driven into the ground,' Mr Sue, who died in 2009, wrote. 'The lifeless face stared vacantly into the fading sunlight. He was only young and no older than his beholder. 'The tissue-thin covering of skin was taut all over the bone structure and the emaciated chest accentuated every rib. 'The open flesh of the buttock bore testimony to the cannibalism of his Japanese captors; they had made a crude attempt to take a slice of rump from the body.' The ring was not mentioned in the passage, but conversations with his father left Mr Sue believing the POW described may have been the owner. Historians from the Australian War Memorial who examined the ring this week believe that if the engraving refers to countries the soldier served in then it is unlikely the owner was Australian. Tens of thousands of Diggers were dispatched to Egypt after 1939 but no Australian units fought in Iraq, leading the memorial to believe the owner was British. The Imperial War Museum in London is now set to comb its records to match a soldier with the ring. Initial research shows British tank and artillery regiments served in Iraq and Egypt. The search will focus on who of those soldiers were transferred to the Pacific theatre of war and subsequently taken prisoner.
