UPDATE, JUNE 18: Divers have recovered five barrels from the lake bottom and believe all had rusted out and contained lake water. Only one had a label indicating it once contained herbicides. Test results are pending. Read more here.

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When diver Lisa Anderson’s hand swept across the silt-covered barrel in the nearly freezing water at the bottom of Wallowa Lake last August, she said her heart almost stopped.

The warning was written in big letters: “Read Label! Contains 2,4-D or 2,4,5-T Weed Killer.”

Combined, the two chemicals were once known by another name: Agent Orange.

The military mixed the two defoliants and sprayed them for years during the Vietnam War. Their use has been connected to numerous health problems in civilians and veterans who were exposed.

And the barrel was sitting 85 feet down in a seemingly pristine alpine lake that provides drinking water to 1,000 residents of nearby Joseph, the mountain town named for the Nez Perce chief.

“When my hand wiped across the label, it was definitely an OMG moment,” Anderson wrote on Facebook.

Anderson, a volunteer member of Blue Mountain Divers, a nonprofit that looks for historically interesting items in lakes and rivers, immediately reported the troubling discovery to the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, the state’s environmental regulator.

“The lake is a treasured gem and to find this barrel is alarming to many people,” she told the agency in her written report, which she submitted with photos and video.

Her nonprofit posted a video on Facebook under the headline: “Commercial Weed Killer Barrel (AGENT ORANGE) in Wallowa Lake.” Alarmed comments piled up underneath it. “We drink out of that!” one said. “Lake water testing needs to be done ASAP!” another said.

A diver with Blue Mountain Divers examines a barrel discovered on the bottom of Wallowa Lake. (Photo courtesy Blue Mountain Divers)

And then they waited, for nearly a year.

The plodding response to the discovery of a barrel potentially laden with toxic herbicides -- in a town’s drinking water supply -- has left residents wondering what could possibly be taking so long.

As many as 12 100-gallon barrels could be on the lake bottom in its southwest corner near a marina. It isn’t known where they came from or whether they contain what the label says they do. But authorities say they believe the drums are intact.

A few years ago, when Blue Mountain Divers found a pipe bomb on the bottom of Wallowa Lake, Joseph resident Mary B. Fort, who regularly swims in the lake and relies on it for her tap water, remembers authorities’ immediate response. She wasn’t allowed near the lake. It was an emergency.

This time, “it’s not a bomb, but it is poison,” Fort said. “It’s my water that I drink. It’s been close to a year and the only people who’ve investigated are the people who discovered it -- private citizens who can’t do more than what they’ve done. It isn’t acceptable.”

Fort said friends have told her they won’t swim in the lake while uncertainty persists about what is in the barrels.

Yet in 10 months since the discovery was reported, the state’s only investigation has been to examine Joseph’s routine drinking water test results, which look every three years for 2,4-D, the less toxic of the two chemicals. It hasn’t been detected in sampling that started in 1984.

Until this week, no tests have been done for 2,4,5-T, an herbicide unavoidably contaminated by dioxin during its manufacturing. The chemical was sprayed in Oregon forests in the 1970s. Its use was halted in 1979 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency following concerns that its dioxin contamination was causing frequent miscarriages in women living along the Alsea River in Oregon’s Coast Range.

Dow Chemical, the manufacturer of the chemical, eventually halted production in 1983.

The type of dioxin found in 2,4,5-T is classified as a probable human carcinogen by the Environmental Protection Agency. “A lot of people would say it’s one of the most toxic synthetic substances known,” said Deke Gunderson, an environmental toxicology professor at Pacific University.

Now, following local news reports, the department said it will test for both chemicals in the water in the lake and at the intakes for Joseph’s treatment plant. The first samples were taken Tuesday. Results will take several days.

“We’re ramping up into the big tourist season there,” said Laura Gleim, a Department of Environmental Quality spokeswoman. “We’re wanting to make sure it’s safe and that people feel comfortable using the lake. Or, if it’s unsafe, we want to take precautions to let people know about that.”

Asked why that testing wasn’t done months ago, Gleim said: “We’re being responsive to additional public concern.”

A label on a barrel found in August 2018 in Wallowa Lake lists the two ingredients in Agent Orange as its possible contents. It isn't known what's in the barrel. (Photo courtesy of Blue Mountain Divers)

As that concern has grown, the government’s timeframe for removing the barrels has accelerated. A week ago, the Wallowa County Chieftain newspaper reported the EPA planned to pull them out as late as October. A U.S. Environmental Protection Agency spokesman this week said the barrels may be removed within a couple of weeks if everything goes well. The barrels will be wrapped up and raised to the surface for removal.

Barrels have been found before in Wallowa Lake, rusty leftovers from a time when empty drums were used as floats or filled with rocks or cement to anchor floating docks. The state responded to one such report at Wallowa Lake in 2012 and found the barrels harmless. But the type and location of the barrels found last August are unusual, Gleim said.

A timeline of events provided by the EPA and state Department of Environmental Quality reveals a lack of urgency in the government response.

The Department of Environmental Quality notified Joseph’s mayor and city council a month after receiving the divers’ August 2018 report. The state agency, which doesn’t have money to pay for what could be a costly recovery operation, notified the EPA in October.

Another two months passed before an EPA representative left a voicemail for the dive group. By then it was December. Winter had fallen and the lake froze over. After the voicemail wasn’t returned, another voicemail was left in March. The EPA found a new number in April and reached someone. Anderson said her group had been in good communication with the regulatory agencies.

In all, it took an EPA official five months to speak with a representative of the dive group. A reporter for The Oregonian/OregonLive found a dive group member on Facebook and spoke to her within mere minutes of sending a question to the group’s public page this week.

When an agency official did connect with a diver, he learned as many as 12 barrels were sitting on the bottom – not just the two they originally thought had been sighted, EPA spokesman Bill Dunbar said. Another 25 smaller barrels were also reported, many of which had rusted out. That made the issue more urgent.

“There are lots of barrels found in all sorts of locations,” Dunbar said. “We don’t have the resources, nor does the state, to chase everything down.”

This month, the EPA hired a professional cleanup dive team to get the barrels out. A remotely operated vehicle is supposed to explore the area around the barrels later this week to assess what’s there, Dunbar said. The barrels could be removed within two weeks, he said, if everything goes perfectly.

Boaters disembark at the dock at Wallowa Lake State Park in northeast Oregon. Divers found the barrels nearby. (Jamie Hale/The Oregonian)LC- Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Jeanne Stellman, a professor in Columbia University’s School of Public Health who has studied Agent Orange exposure, said residents should be comforted that the less hazardous chemical hasn’t shown up in drinking water tests. If 2,4-D was in the water, it likely would have shown up even after going through the treatment process, Stellman said.

But she said the water should be tested for the more toxic 2,4,5-T as well.

“I don't think you are facing a crisis,” Stellman said. “I wouldn't ignore the problem, but I also wouldn't start a ‘drink bottled water’ campaign.”

If the barrels contained 2,4,5-T, it would likely have less dioxin than what was used in Agent Orange, Stellman said. The military’s mixture contained far more dioxin than domestic supplies, she said.

In a barrel made for domestic use, Stellman said, dioxin might have been present at about three parts per million – imagine roughly eight drops of ink in a 100-gallon barrel. The lake holds about 78 billion gallons of water at capacity.

The EPA and state Department of Environmental Quality have planned a June 25 meeting in Joseph to brief the community. Details are here.

— Rob Davis

rdavis@oregonian.com

503.294.7657; @robwdavis

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