High rates of cancer among military pilots have been discovered by a Pentagon study.

And for the first time, it’s been shown that ground crews that fuel, maintain and launch those aircraft are getting sick as well.

The Pentagon released the study in early February, the Associated Press reported.

Retired military aviators had long sought the data, the AP said on Sunday, March 19.

[The melanoma doesn’t surprise me. After spending the better part of 10 years on a Marine Corps flight line, in places with sun as intense as SoCal and the Philippines – and not near as much time as some of my squadron mates, on flight decks in the Pacific – I had actinic keratosis develop while I was still on active duty and skin cancer subsequently in these later years. I’ve known a few pilots whose skin cancer turned deadly, and they attributed that to the sun’s rays being intensified by the cockpit canopy glass. Made perfect sense to me. NTM we spent all those years in clouds of JP-5 fumes while fueling and then the exhaust clouds of up to ten birds at one time turning and burning. You should have seen the stuff we washed birds WITH, lol. Nasty stew of things nobody was wiser to at the time and an SPF sunscreen was unheard of. ~ Beege]