Photo gallery: Vietnam, US begin historic Agent Orange cleanup
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A red warning poster reading "Dioxin-contominated area. Livestock and poultry raising and fishing are probihited", is seen at the Ho Sen or Lotus Lake located next to Danang airport, a former US airbase, where a ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project is held on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
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Attendants sit next to a field contaminated with dioxin before a ceremony marking the start of a project to clean up dioxin left over from the Vietnam War, at a former U.S. military base in Danang, Vietnam on Thursday Aug. 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AP
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A local reporter wears a mask during a guided tour at a dioxin-contaminated area at Danang airport, a former US airbase, where a ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project is held on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
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Vietnamese army's colonel Tran Thanh Cong points at dioxin-contaminated areas on map at the venue of the ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project held at the former US airbase in the central city of Danang on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
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Unidentified US constructors' representatives a dioxin-contaminated at Danang airport, a former US airbase, where a ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project is held on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
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US Ambassador to Vietnam David Shear (3rd left), Vietnamese general Nguyen Chi Vinh (1st left), Deputy Defense Minister and Francis Donovan, USAID Mission Director for Vietnam cut a ribbon during the ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project held at the former US airbase in the central city of Danang on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
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US Ambassador to Vietnam David Shear (2nd left) shakes hands with Vietnamese General Nguyen Chi Vinh, Deputy Defense Minister as they attend the ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project held at the former US airbase in the central city of Danang on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
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In this photo taken on Wednesday, Aug. 8, 2012, Dang Cong Chinh, center, plays with other children at a rehabilitation center in Danang, Vietnam. The children were born with physical and mental disabilities that the center's director says were caused by their parents' exposure to the chemical dioxin in the defoliant Agent Orange. -- PHOTO: AP
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In this photo taken on Wednesday, Aug. 8, 2012, Le Trung Hong Phuc, 9, plays with colored blocks at a rehabilitation center in Danang, Vietnam. -- PHOTO: AP
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In this photo taken on Wednesday, Aug. 8, 2012, Le Van Tam, 14, is picked up by his father at a rehabilitation center in Danang, Vietnam. -- PHOTO: AP
A red warning poster reading "Dioxin-contominated area. Livestock and poultry raising and fishing are probihited", is seen at the Ho Sen or Lotus Lake located next to Danang airport, a former US airbase, where a ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project is held on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
Attendants sit next to a field contaminated with dioxin before a ceremony marking the start of a project to clean up dioxin left over from the Vietnam War, at a former U.S. military base in Danang, Vietnam on Thursday Aug. 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AP
A local reporter wears a mask during a guided tour at a dioxin-contaminated area at Danang airport, a former US airbase, where a ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project is held on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
Vietnamese army's colonel Tran Thanh Cong points at dioxin-contaminated areas on map at the venue of the ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project held at the former US airbase in the central city of Danang on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
Unidentified US constructors' representatives a dioxin-contaminated at Danang airport, a former US airbase, where a ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project is held on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
US Ambassador to Vietnam David Shear (3rd left), Vietnamese general Nguyen Chi Vinh (1st left), Deputy Defense Minister and Francis Donovan, USAID Mission Director for Vietnam cut a ribbon during the ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project held at the former US airbase in the central city of Danang on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
US Ambassador to Vietnam David Shear (2nd left) shakes hands with Vietnamese General Nguyen Chi Vinh, Deputy Defense Minister as they attend the ground-breaking ceremony of the joint US-Vietnam Dioxin Cleanning Project held at the former US airbase in the central city of Danang on Aug 9, 2012. -- PHOTO: AFP
In this photo taken on Wednesday, Aug. 8, 2012, Dang Cong Chinh, center, plays with other children at a rehabilitation center in Danang, Vietnam. The children were born with physical and mental disabilities that the center's director says were caused by their parents' exposure to the chemical dioxin in the defoliant Agent Orange. -- PHOTO: AP
In this photo taken on Wednesday, Aug. 8, 2012, Le Trung Hong Phuc, 9, plays with colored blocks at a rehabilitation center in Danang, Vietnam. -- PHOTO: AP
In this photo taken on Wednesday, Aug. 8, 2012, Le Van Tam, 14, is picked up by his father at a rehabilitation center in Danang, Vietnam. -- PHOTO: AP
DANANG, Vietnam (AFP) - From deformed infants to grandparents with cancer, families near Vietnam's Dnang Airbase have long blamed the toxic legacy of war for their ills. Now after a decades-long wait, a historic "Agent Orange" clean-up is finally beginning.
The base was a key site in the United States (US) defoliant programme during the Vietnam War, and much of the 80 million litres of Agent Orange used during "Operation Ranch Hand" was mixed, stored and loaded onto planes there.
But on Thursday, the US and Vietnam began a long-awaited joint cleanup effort at the site - using technology which will heat the contaminated soil to temperatures high enough to break dioxin down into harmless compounds.
