Military Firefighter: Toxic Exposure and VA Claims

Beginning in the 1970s, the Department of Defense used aqueous film forming foam (AFFF) as its standard agent against petroleum fires. Military firefighters sprayed it on aircraft crashes, fuel spills, and vehicle fires, and discharged it repeatedly in live fire training exercises, which the VA identifies as a major source of chemical release on bases. The VA specifically notes that veterans who worked as military firefighters may have been exposed to PFAS while using AFFF to extinguish jet fuel fires. Foam contact with skin and soaked gloves and bunker gear extended exposure beyond the incident itself. The Department of Defense stopped using PFAS containing foam for training and, after invoking its second and final statutory waiver, must end AFFF use entirely by October 1, 2026.

PFAS, the chemicals that make AFFF effective, are called forever chemicals because they persist in the body and the environment. Firefighters encountered them through direct skin contact with foam, through contaminated protective gear, and through drinking water: foam released during training and emergency responses is a major source of groundwater contamination on military bases, and the Department of Defense has identified 723 installations where PFAS may have been used or released. ATSDR reports epidemiological evidence associating PFOA with kidney and testicular cancer, along with changes in cholesterol, liver enzymes, and immune response. The VA describes the overall scientific and medical evidence on PFAS health effects as currently inconclusive.

NIOSH researchers documented that firefighters encounter contaminants known or suspected to cause cancer, including combustion byproducts such as benzene and formaldehyde. Military firefighters inhaled and absorbed these chemicals during structural fires in base housing and hangars, during aircraft and vehicle fires fed by fuel and hydraulic fluid, and during overhaul work after a fire was knocked down, when crews often shed breathing apparatus while smoke still lingered. Soot on the skin and turnout gear that was rarely decontaminated kept the exposure going between calls. These exposures were the focus of the NIOSH study of nearly 30,000 career firefighters that found elevated cancer rates.

Many barracks, hangars, housing units, and shipboard spaces built before the 1980s contained asbestos insulation and building materials. When those structures burned or collapsed, asbestos fibers became airborne in the smoke and debris that firefighters worked in, both during suppression and during salvage and cleanup. NIOSH specifically pointed to asbestos from older building materials in fire debris as the likely explanation for its finding that firefighters developed malignant mesothelioma at twice the rate of the general United States population, the first study to document excess mesothelioma among United States firefighters.