Remembering firefighters hosing toxic foam on children, they poison the playground

The figure shows 30,000 residents eligible to participate in a $132.7 million settlement agreed by the Commonwealth of Nations on Monday after being sued by seven communities across Australia contaminated by fire foam. is based on the fact that

But Craig Allsop, class action co-head of Shine attorneys who represent the plaintiffs, said the payments were made on the premise that not all eligible residents will participate in the class action.

Participation rates in shareholder class action lawsuits are typically in the 20% to 30% range, he said.

Allsop said Shine’s modeling showed that customers would receive well over $4,400 per person.

“If they only got that much, I wouldn’t have gone to court yesterday,” Allsop said Tuesday. “I can’t give you a specific number. I can safely say it’s not $4,400. None of the members of the group are going to make any sudden changes.”

Allsop noted that group members would receive different levels of compensation depending on where they live and how severely their property was affected by the pollution.

The parties are set to go to arbitration again this week in a final effort to reconcile the Aboriginal community of Wreck Bay, 200km south of Sydney.

“I think it’s a shame that the Wreck Bay community isn’t recognized in the same way as other sites,” Allsop said.

The nine fire stations under investigation are Alexandria, Byron Bay, Liverpool, Greenacre, Armidale, Albion Park, Denilikin, Taro and Londonderry.

FRNSW’s latest annual report states that the state conducted chemical tests at 11 fire stations, secured $8.9 million for land remediation, and received funding from the New South Wales Treasury to resolve the issue. said it was seeking funding from

In November, union leaders challenged the process of prioritizing fire stations as places of concern.

FRNSW had distributed questionnaires to fire departments asking for details on foam use from 1976 to 2007.

In a communication seen by Heraldunion officials questioned how credible the investigation was, given that some stations no longer had employees who handled the foam.

FRNSW officials said that in such cases, attempts were made to contact retired officers or former officers who moved to other stations.

“Given the passage of time since AFFF, [aqueous film forming foam] was used, and the fact that this was anecdotal information meant that this information was considered more reliable in prioritizing sites, so the actual site settings were rated higher in the risk rating ( This was what the EPA requested),” she said.

According to the survey results, Herald When asked how often foam training exercises were conducted between 1976 and 2007, several participants answered ‘unknown’ or ‘unable to answer’.

Several fire departments said they conducted foam-fighting drills in public parks, playgrounds and, in one instance, stadiums.

Drury said firefighting is an inherently dangerous profession and not all risks can be controlled.

“We can do something about PFAS,” he said. “We are not ready for the next generation of firefighters to take on this.”