Speaker Has Warnings For Wainscott Residents Worried About Water Contamination

A water specialist told residents of Wainscott this weekend that he would recommend against bathing or cooking with the water from their wells if they have been found to contain the chemicals PFOS or PFOA, as more than 100 have in the hamlet in recent months.

“These chemicals are dangerous—I’m not going to sugarcoat it,” said Paul Trafas, whose company, AquaFuture Inc., makes household water filters. “You don’t want to shower with this stuff. You don’t want to drink it. It bio-accumulates.”

Mr. Trafas said that he would even be wary about swimming in a swimming pool filled with water contaminated with PFOS/PFOA levels above 10 parts per trillion.

The official Environmental Protection Agency health advisory level for the chemicals, formally known as perfluorooctane sulfonate and perfluorooctanoic acid, is 90 parts per trillion. Nine homes in Wainscott have been found to have levels of the chemicals above that level, and another 131 wells have been found to have traces of the chemicals below the health advisory level.

Mr. Trafas had been invited to the gathering of Wainscott residents on Sunday afternoon by attorney Dan Osborn, who has filed a class-action lawsuit against East Hampton Town and six companies that manufacture chemical fire suppressants believed to be the source of the contamination discovered in Wainscott well water this past fall and winter.

Mr. Osborn told the residents, all of whom are potentially plaintiffs in the case, that among the demands he was making in the claim was that there be medical monitoring of residents for years to come—including blood tests to look for signs of PFOS/PFOA in their systems—to track medical conditions they may develop that could be caused by the presence of PFOS/PFOA in their water.

Mr. Trafas, whose Ronkonkoma-based company makes water filters, noted that the chemicals can be effectively scrubbed out of a property’s tap water with carbon filters attached at the home’s well connection, or with under-the-sink reverse osmosis systems. The whole-house systems can cost upward of $5,000, he said, but Mr. Osborn said that the intention of the lawsuit would be to ensure that any residents who put forward the money for such systems in their homes will be reimbursed.

Councilman Jeff Bragman said that he is also pushing for the town itself to create a fund to reimburse residents immediately for the costs of installing filtration systems.

The town is also working on plans to extend Suffolk County Water Authority mains throughout the entire hamlet. The town is expected to vote this week to create an official Wainscott water district, so that the town can apply for federal and state grants to help fund the water mains project.

Mr. Osborn said that the lawsuit also seeks damages for residents for loss of property values, both for sales and for summer rentals.