Alarms sound over trash fires in war zones of Afghanistan, Iraq

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Photo timeline: The war in Afghanistan

The war in Afghanistan began on Oct. 7, 2001, as the U.S. military launched an operation in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S. The war continues today.

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Judge Roger W. Titus is considering whether to allow the case to proceed.

Kevin Robbins, 47, of Ludington, Mich., burned trash at Camp Delta in Al Kut, Iraq, for three months in 2005. The father of seven had decided to close his drywall business and join the Army after his brother, Todd J. Robbins, was killed in Iraq in 2003. After a recruiter told him that he was too old, he got a job with KBR to help out any way he could.

"We just dug holes in the ground, and when the trash came in, we put it in the holes and we burned it," Robbins said. "Everything. Plastic, tires, Humvee doors, vehicles, medical waste, whatever they brought in. Ammunition, rockets."

Christopher Sweet said his wife, Jessica, an Air Force sergeant and mother of three, did not talk much about the burn pits when she worked near one at the Bagram air base in Afghanistan during a four-month deployment in 2007. But as the fitness training leader for her squadron, she did daily workouts and five-mile runs.

After she came home, the fatigue and fevers set in. Sweet was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia.

"She started recalling what she experienced with the burn pits," said Christopher Sweet, who lives in Brandywine with their children. "She was convinced the smoke she was inhaling while she was in Afghanistan had to have contributed to the leukemia. I didn't care how it happened. I just wanted her to get better."

Jessica Sweet died in February 2009. She was 30.

Her husband joined the lawsuit. "If there are other people out there who are sick because of the exposure to the burn pits," he said, "she would want to help."