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Local number press register7/1/2023 ![]() ![]() In the decades since, as the facilities have aged, former and current missileers have worried about asbestos in the hardened facilities, about ventilation of the air they have breathed from old duct systems while underground, about the water they have drunk and emissions from equipment they used. ![]() Missileers are young military officers who monitor, operate and stand ready to fire the nation’s nuclear warheads - sitting alert in underground launch control centers for shifts that can last from 24 to 48 hours.īut both the launch control centers and the missile silos they oversee were built more than 60 years ago. “But what if you’re a young lieutenant who did four years and got out, and 15 years later you have an awful blood cancer and you are paying God knows how much?” “His care didn’t bankrupt my family,” the son said. Walter Reed doctors said his six-month battle could have cost more than $1 million if the family had to go through a private hospital and insurance, Fawcett Jr. Because the elder Fawcett served a 20-year military career, he received lifetime military medical care. I’m very happy that there’s some spotlight being put on it, because then it will make people more aware, and kids who are going into the service may ask more questions, and it may help in that regard.”īut the son is hoping the Air Force will do more to look for possible causes. Too big a fight,” she said of trying to push the Air Force to figure out why her son and other missileers were getting sick. Her son, Jason Jenness, died five months after his diagnosis. Our records show it was established in 1966 and incorporated in Alabama. To her, the letter left her feeling that the cancers were “being swept under the rug.” The Mobile Press Register Inc 401 North Water Street Mobile, AL 36602 (251) 219-5400 Visit Website About Contact Details Reviews Claim This Listing About Categorized under Newspaper Publishing and Printing Manufacturers. He died from non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 2001 at the age of 31.Įven back then, his mother says, she was concerned his cancer had to do with his service, “and his friends were concerned, because there were rumors.” But when she reached out to the Air Force, “I got a form letter,” she said. Jason Jenness was a senior missile launch officer in the 1990s with the now-deactivated 564th missile squadron at Malmstrom. King Charles III takes day off after busy coronation weekendīut some also hope a spotlight on the issue will at least result in the Air Force carrying out a full cancer study of all the men and women who have worked with the nation’s nuclear warheads, and hopefully an easier path to medical care. ![]()
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