LIMESTONE – Tyler Derrah has a hard time sleeping at night. He’s worried about cracks in his chimney and foundation.

Derrah and his wife, Christy, say there was nothing wrong with their one-story home on the Van Buren Road when they purchased it three years ago.

“When we were shopping for a new home, we were really picky,” said Tyler Derrah, sitting in his kitchen Saturday afternoon. “We looked at a lot of homes before deciding on this one.”

Now, Derrah alleges his house has damage totaling $38,500, caused when the Navy SEALs demolition team conducted military exercises in the area 18 months ago. The training maneuvers were carried out at the federal wildlife refuge on the former Loring Air Force Base, which is less than two miles from the Derrahs’ residence.

From his kitchen window, Tyler Derrah can see the refuge and point to where the SEALs used explosives to destroy concrete bunkers, a water tower and storage facilities, all of which he said contributed to the damage in his home.

Military and refuge officials have denied that the explosions had any adverse impact on the Derrahs’ home. But for now, all training has ceased.

“It is the Navy’s position that there is no way the damage to the Derrahs’ home was from the training exercises,” Christopher French, an attorney with the Judge Advocate General’s Office in Virginia said Friday. “Their claims have been investigated.”

Calls to the Navy SEALs public affairs office were not returned.

The SEALs were in Limestone for demolition training at the invitation of municipal officials and in support of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which was looking for a cost-effective way to remove the old buildings at the refuge.

“In the eyes of our department, those structures are considered hazardous, and it was our goal to remove them from public use,” said Don Lima, Fish and Wildlife official at the refuge.

Between October 1998 and April 2000, the SEALs conducted five training exercises at the refuge using C-4, dynamite and TNT, Lima said.

By having the SEALS conduct their training at the site, Lima said, the buildings were removed at no cost to his department.

“I don’t believe we are the cause of the damage,” he said. “Experts from the Navy and Army Corps of Engineers said we are not having an impact.”

But Derrah said cracks started appearing in his home almost immediately after the first of the blasts.

“I found two cracks in my chimney and one in the cellar,” Derrah said. “Now, I have 31 cracks in an 8-foot section of my chimney and water leaking into my cellar from cracks in the floors and walls that were not there when we bought the house.”

In addition to the cracks, Derrah pointed to bumps in his living room floor where nails are working their way out, an area where his floor is settling around a main support beam, a bedroom door that no longer remains shut and a floor that bounces when someone walks across the kitchen.

“The Navy blew my house up,” he said.

The Derrahs’ neighbors Robert and Leigh Wales say cracks surfaced in their home after the blasting, but they put their damage at $1,200, far below the Derrahs’.

Derrah said his insurance company has refused to pay for the repairs, citing a clause in his policy exempting marring, cracking or damage due to settling.

“For me to fix all this damage I would either have to take out a second mortgage or declare bankruptcy,” Derrah said. “I’m in a lose-lose situation.”

Derrah has contacted the offices of both of Maine’s U.S. senators for assistance and will next appeal to the Office of Veterans Affairs.

“I may lose my house,” he said. “This is not right.”

After a meeting with town officials last week, Lima said it was decided to halt the demolition exercise for the time being.

“I called the Navy and we all feel it’s been supersaturated and agreed to go ahead and take a break,” he said. “They’ve done all the training they need for now.”

However, the door remains open for future training, he said.

Lima questioned the culpability of the Navy given that homes directly in line with the blasts and between the Derrah residence and the refuge had no damage.

Wales, a retired law enforcement officer and native of California, said he is familiar with seismic activity and that it is common to have some structures damaged and others unscathed in cases of blasting. “We saw that all the time with earthquakes in California,” he said.

Derrah said he does not see how the Navy can claim the explosions had no impact when no geological surveys were done before blasting began. “This is a no-brainer,” he said. “It’s arrogance on the part of the Navy.”

The Navy, Derrah said, did send an investigator to his home after the initial damage claim was filed. Based on an examination of the home lasting more than an hour, the Navy denied the claim and a subsequent appeal, then informed Derrah the Navy could not be sued as an entity.

A Limestone selectmen who visited the Derrah home came away with a different impression.

“I feel bad for these kids,” Selectman Greg Ward said. “They definitely have a problem.”

Visiting the Derrahs’ home, Ward noticed cracks in the cellar floor, walls and chimney that appeared fresh. “Whether they were caused by the blasting, I can’t say for certain but [the Derrahs] were there when it happened.”

Ward said he was reminded of one morning a year ago when he thought his own furnace had exploded.

“It was the blasting from the base [and] I personally feel the blasting contributed to the damages at the Derrahs’,” he said, stressing that he was not speaking for the selectmen.

“The Navy said there is no evidence they caused the damages,” Wales said “but the investigators did not even look at the evidence. This shows a callous attitude. Obviously they intended to deny this claim the moment it was filed.”

The Derrahs and the Waleses want to remain in northern Maine, but they worry about the future.

“I just want the Navy to make it right and to fix my home,” Derrah said.

“I would hope the Navy would look for alternatives to the blasting so my home and maybe others don’t get in worse condition,” Wales said.

Last week, Ward said, the board agreed to table any future action inviting the SEALs back, pending a study of the training’s impact. “There was talk of doing geological studies, but no one seemed to take responsibility for doing it,” he said.

“It’s ironic,” Christy Derrah said. “I can look out my window and see the ‘Welcome to Limestone’ sign inviting people to ‘experience our quality of life.’ I’d like them to come experience my quality of life right now.”