The Torchlight Initiative

At a memorial service in 2022, veteran Air Force Capt. Monte Watts bumped into a fellow former Minuteman III nuclear missile operator, who told him that she had non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Watts knew other missileers with similar cancers. But the connection really hit home later that same January day, when the results of a blood test revealed that Watts himself had chronic lymphocytic leukemia, a type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Wounded Warriors like Mike Yamzon are telling their stories and trying to protect current and future ICBM Community members.

Stage 4 mesothelioma—seven months after retiring—caused by years in toxic, Cold War–era ICBM sites filled with asbestos, PCBs, and contaminated air. Col Yamzon speaks for 800+ missile community members with diagnoses and for those already gone.

We’re not dying from enemy fire, but from our own environment.

We need independent eyes, real accountability, and action to protect today’s missile community.

He’s wounded and tired—but not giving up. Torchlight will keep fighting for truth, care, and the lives of those still fighting from this foxhole.

The Air Force has spent more than two years studying cancer risks to Airmen who work with the service’s intercontinental ballistic missiles. Now lawmakers in Congress are placing fresh scrutiny on the issue and have prepared legislation that would direct the service to clean silos and launch facilities. 

Draft versions of the annual defense policy bill from both houses of Congress each contain provisions regarding the safety of ICBM facilities and the Air Force’s investigation of potential increased cancer rates among those who have worked on the sites.