Las Vegas SUN: Gulf War
legacy
Sun 4/14/97
About 200 yards away from MSR Dodge, three to five people in full chemical gear -- gas masks and protective garments -- were samplingthe air and soil when Wegner said he spotted them.
Although he was headed to King Khalid Military City where a better-equipped Army hospital would X-ray his head, Wegner stopped to assist. He said he put on his own chemical gear, attached M9 chemical detection papers and joined the others.
M9 and M8 papers were distributed to all soldiers and worn attached to clothing or equipment. The papers are sensitive to droplets of liquid chemical agents, but were known to produce false readings during the Gulf War.
Wegner's M9 papers spotted, so he opened an M256 detection kit and took a second sample. A 256 kit was the most widely available chemical detector in the U.S. military. It contained vials of liquid chemicals that when combined and exposed identify the presence of hazardous levels of chemical vapors. The test takes about 20 minutes.
Wegner's test came back positive.
"I broke open the kit and said, 'Jesus! Let's get out of here,'" Wegner said.
Wegner grabbed a sample of sand from the area. Then he and the NBC team were taken to a chemical decontamination unit where they removed their garments and decontaminated the FOX vehicle.
The Army had 60 German-made FOX systems, wheeled, armored vehicles equipped with mass spectrometers for the identification of chemical contaminants. The vehicles usually were used to confirm other readings.
During the three-hour cleanup, Wegner said one of the sergeants told him the FOX unit had registered a chemical agent and a probable biological agent. But an Army major told Wegner that the amount of chemicals detected was so small that there was no reason to panic the troops.
"It made no sense to me whatsoever ... although I have read newspaper reports that other people were told the exact same thing that I was told, 'Say nothing,'" he said.
Dismissed by the major, Wegner went to the hospital. He said he began to feel nauseous and a day or two later developed a rash that persists to this day.
"I look back at it now and say 'Hey, these are signs of chemical exposure.'"
The Pentagon is investigating 13 reports where M-256 kits and 21 reports where FOX units detected chemical agents. But the Feb. 18 or 19 incident described by Wegner is not among them.
A Pentagon spokesman said it is possible the report was overlooked because the major had determined the amounts to be harmless.