Forty years after the end of the Vietnam War, parts of the
country remain contaminated by the defoliants the U.S. military used to
deny its enemy the cover of the jungle. Now, technology developed in
Japan may be poised to help cleanse the land.
Japanese construction company Shimizu in late October brought
contaminated soil from Vietnam to Japan for purification experiments.
The company's technology proved effective in cleaning up soil
contaminated by the disaster at Tokyo Electric Power's Fukushima
Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in March 2011. The Vietnamese government is
paying close attention to the tests.
LINGERING DANGER
During the war, the U.S. military had an airfield in Bien Hoa, in the
southern Vietnamese province of Dong Nai -- about an hour's drive from
Ho Chi Minh City. The airfield, now used by the Vietnamese Air Force, is
"the most dioxin-contaminated place in the world," according to
Vietnamese daily Bao Thanh Nien.
U.S. military planes that
sprayed chemical defoliants -- the most notorious being Agent Orange --
were washed at the airfield after returning from their missions. The
location remains so contaminated possibly because the water used to wash
the planes penetrated deep into the soil, carrying dioxins and other
toxic substances with it.
Areas around former U.S. air bases
in Danang and Phu Cat, in the central and southern parts of Vietnam, are
polluted for similar reasons. Along with Bien Hoa, they are known as
the "three hot spots."
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