Navy didn’t understand well-documented risks posed by Hawaii fuel tanks, watchdog says

Associated Press

HONOLULU (AP) — A U.S. military watchdog says Navy officials lacked sufficient understanding of the risks of maintaining massive fuel storage tanks on top of a drinking water well at Pearl Harbor where spilled jet fuel poisoned more than 6,000 people. The Defense Department’s inspector general says this inadequate awareness came even though Navy officials had engineering drawings and environmental studies that described the risks. The inspector general included the finding in a long list of Navy failures identified in two reports after a yearslong investigation into the 2021 fuel leak. The Navy says it is implementing corrective actions and is committed to constant improvement.