Deborah lives in Fort Worth where industry claims the gas is dry so the emissions are less harmful.
Chesapeake began drilling near Deborah's home in April 2010. She reported egregious odors to the Texas Commision on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) hotline but the response time was unsatisfactory.
The following compounds were detected on Deborah Rogers' property:
- Benzene,
- dichlorodifluoromethane,
- chloroform,
- m&p xylene,
- 0 xylene,
- 1,2,4 tricholorbenzene,
- toluene,
- carbon disulfide,
- dimethyldisulfide,
- methyly ethyl disulfide,
- methyl propyl disulfide,
- diethyl disulfide,
- ethyly,
- methylethyl disulfide,
- dimethyl trisulfide and
- ethyl n-propyl disulfide.
All the sulfur compounds were above short term AND long term TCEQ Effects Screening Levels. Carbon disulfide was 300 times higher than EPA's normal for ambient urban air.
Further testing again found toxic compounds including benzene barely below the NEW TCEQ long term levels and carbon disulfide about 250 times the norm for ambient urban air according to EPA's levels.
TCEQ did not test during that same timeframe because their toxic vapor analyzers are not sensitive enough to pick up the VOCs.
Deborah has experienced nausea from the strong odors and two massive nose bleeds that began with severe headaches.
“The nose bleeds,” Deborah said, “are spontaneous and very frightening because the blood flows copiously and within seconds you are covered in blood, your face, your hands, your clothes. I have never had nose bleeds in my life either.”
The evening after her first environmental tests, two baby goats and 6 baby chicks were asphyxiated. The senior veterinary toxicologist at Texas A&M wrote a letter of concern after looking at the test results concluding that the compounds were problematic to the animal's health and to the food chain because these compounds are known to be ingested or inhaled and magnify up the food chain in milk and meat.
Dr. David Sterling, Chair of Environmental and Occupational Health at UNT Health Science Center and Dr. Al Armendariz, then a professor at SMU's Lyle School of Engineering also wrote letters expressing concern about health effects from these levels of chemicals.
