A Utah man who was diagnosed with cancer after working six years as a groundskeeper for his church in water contaminated after the Red Butte Creek oil spill is suing The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the oil and gas company responsible for the leak for his medical expenses.
Allan Flandro’s acute myeloid leukemia is now in remission, but in July 2016, when he was first diagnosed, physicians were worried he wouldn’t survive. Flandro underwent multiple surgeries and invasive treatments after his diagnosis, which came as a surprise to physicians, since Flandro, then 40, was so young, didn’t have a history of the disease, had never smoked and hadn’t been around any dangerous chemicals or known carcinogens, according to the lawsuit, filed Friday in Utah’s 3rd District Court.
At the time, Flandro didn’t realize the water he was working near (and sometimes in) as a groundskeeper for the Garden Park Ward, a well-known and historic Mormon meetinghouse between Harvard and Yale avenues, was contaminated from the June and December 2010 oil spills into Red Butte Creek. The spills dumped a combined 54,600 gallons of crude oil into the creek, where it later spread to the Liberty Park pond and the Jordan River.
Red Butte Creek flows directly through the the ward’s property, including into several ponds and diversion canals. As a groundskeeper — a job Flandro was called to as part of his church membership — he was required to clean and maintain the creek and ponds for weddings and other events that were often hosted there.
Callings in the LDS Church are voluntary, meaning Flandro did the job without pay.
According to the lawsuit, the groundskeeping job was “often arduous,” requiring Flandro to come in contact with the creek water, mud and other debris.
In 2010, Flandro developed rashes and blisters on his legs from working in the water but didn’t think anything of them, because Chevron and church leaders said the air and water in the Garden Park property were safe.
He began to put the pieces of his mystery diagnosis together after researching acute myeloid leukemia and learning exposure to benzene, a byproduct of crude oil, is a leading cause. A friend reminded him of the oil spill, and he "began to connect the dots,” Flandro said.
Testing done on Flandro’s behalf has since found that crude oil from the spill had seeped into the mud and debris around the creek, flowing into the ward property, where it pooled in an underground vault beneath the pond. In cleaning the grounds, Flandro had unknowingly been stirring up residual crude oils and crude oil polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and ingesting and inhaling them.
“[Flandro] was often virtually covered with these contaminated, toxic waters and mud,” according to the lawsuit.
Flandro’s lawsuit accuses Chevron and the LDS Church of negligence. Flandro is also suing Rocky Mountain Power, which operated an electrical facility near the site. A power surge in that area during a storm purportedly damaged Chevron’s pipeline, causing both 2010 spills.
Chevron and Rocky Mountain Power settled a lawsuit regarding the spill in September 2017.
Flandro and his wife, Susanne, are seeking an undetermined amount of money in their lawsuit, in part to pay for his medical expenses. He is also seeking money for pain and suffering, reduced life expectancy and physical, emotional, mental and cognitive impairments.
Representatives from Chevron and the LDS Church didn’t immediately respond to request for comment Friday night. A spokesman for Rocky Mountain Power declined to comment.
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