“The Hangar Cafe has developed a following for its food, but Gov. Phil Scott brought his cabinet there for the water.

The cabinet met in the restaurant at the Rutland-Southern Vermont Regional Airport at the beginning of Scott’s ‘Capitol for a Day’ event in Rutland County on Monday, and the governor opened the meeting by having the cabinet toast with — and drink from — glasses of water from the restaurant’s taps.

The move was aimed at assuring the public that PFOA contamination in some wells nearby had not affected the airport. The chemical has been found in wells serving the nearby Airport Business Park, but the wells at the airport itself remain clear — a fact Scott reiterated as he took a drink.

State officials say they believe the PFOA (Perfluorooctanoic acid) in the industrial park’s water originated with firefighting foam used at the airport in training sessions and following a plane crash in the 1980s. The restaurant’s owner, Charlotte Bunnell, said business dropped off due to a confusion of the airport industrial park with the airport itself.

‘To date, 36 water supplies have been tested and unsafe levels of PFOA had been detected in 17 of those,’ Natural Resources Secretary Julie Moore said Monday. The highest level taken from the local wells was 54 parts per trillion, which Moore said was below the levels found in wells in Bennington but still above the 20 parts per trillion safety standard…

Mill River Union High School’s water is also being tested at the request of officials there. Moore said the samples should be collected this week and that the testing typically has about a two-week turnaround. She said treatment systems were being installed in the wells serving the industrial park and that they expected to have a ‘permanent solution’ online in the next month.

Meanwhile, the state is also studying the site to identify the exact source of the contamination and how it moved through the area. Moore said they believe the bedrock formations contributed to how the contamination spread.”

Read the full article by Gordon Dritshilo