Merle Savage has a wheezy, guttural smoker’s cough. But the 71-year-old former Alaska resident and author of Silence in the Sound never smoked a day in her life. She did, however, spend four months as a general foreman during the Exxon Valdez oil spill recovery project in 1989. And she has a message for anyone working at the BP oil disaster sites: “You’ve got to use your common sense. Breathing crude oil is toxic.”

Savage moved to Alaska in 1988–just one year before the Exxon Valdez oil spill ravaged Prince William Sound. After the spill, Savage decided to take action. She was assigned to clean oil-coated rocks on the beach, but says that Exxon never provided legitimate safety training. And since Exxon never told her that breathing crude oil was toxic, she didn’t think twice about spraying hot water onto the oily rocks.

When the dizziness and vomiting set in, Savage assumed it was just the flu. “We were housed in close quarters, and I could see how the flu could go around repeatedly,” she says. The “flu” continued as Savage moved into a position as general foreman on the spill’s cleanup barges. But she didn’t realize quite how much her health had deteriorated until leaving the cleanup operation.

“I was in the doctor’s office continually,” Savage says. “She always heard my

stomach rolling and one day she said ‘Have you eaten anything toxic or

had any contaminated water?’ I said no, never thinking it was the crude

oil.” Savage went on to develop a frightening list of symptoms: cirrhosis of the liver (she doesn’t drink), rheumatoid arthritis, constant diarrhea, and respiratory problems.

When Savage was contacted by Riki Ott, a marine toxicologist specializing in oil pollution, she finally put the pieces together. According to Ott, respiratory and central nervous system problems are common among oil spill cleanup workers. In a recent blog post, she explains her concerns: