OXNARD : Copter Firms Face Toxic-Dumping Suit

Ventura County officials have filed a suit in Superior Court alleging that a group of helicopter crop-dusting companies dumped toxic wastes and abandoned four leaking underground fuel tanks at Oxnard Airport.

The suit accuses the group--which includes Evergreen International Aviation Inc., Evergreen Helicopters, Evergreen Aircraft Sales and Leasing Co., Condor Helicopters and Aviation Inc. and their executives--of dumping pesticides at a helipad there. The suit also alleges that the defendants abandoned three 2,000-gallon tanks for aviation fuel and one 1,000-gallon gasoline tank, which leaked fuel into the ground and polluted ground water.

The alleged dumping took place between 1966 and 1986, when the companies leased land from Ventura County for a helipad at the airport on Patterson Road near West 5th Street, according to the suit.

The contamination of the ground and ground water around the helipad reduced the value of the property and violated state health and safety codes, the suit alleges.

The county has already spent $90,000 to begin cleaning up the fuel and chemicals and will have to spend more, the suit contends.

The suit also alleges that the county paid $120,000 in legal fees and a $50,000 settlement in a 1986 lawsuit filed by airport workers who claimed that the dumping made them ill.

The dumping also could expose the county to lawsuits from people claiming that it injured them and to prosecution by governmental environmental agencies.

The suit asks the court to order the defendants to pay those damages and any future damages caused by the dumping, but the Evergreen companies and Condor Helicopters have already denied any responsibility for the damages.

Evergreen and Condor officials could not be reached Wednesday for comment.