The man who blew the whistle on illegal asbestos removal at the Cayuga County (NY) Board of Elections building has filed suit against the county after being fired from his job there.

According to an article in the Syracuse Post-Standard, Anthony Garropy, who now lives in North Carolina, and his wife, Bonnie, filed the suit on October 16, seeking to regain his old job with salary and benefits, asking for payment of lost wages, and addressing a long list of additional damages. No amount was specified in the suit.
Garropy had only worked for Cayuga County for a few weeks in early 2006 when he was asked to help county carpenter John Chick remove a boiler and pipes from the basement of the building. Garropy immediately recognized that the pipes and boiler were insulated with asbestos, some of which was already damaged and could be quite dangerous.

Chick, who has since admitted guilt in ordering the illegal removal of asbestos from the building, told Garropy he would be fired if he didn’t assist in the removal of the boiler and pipes. The lawsuit alleges Garropy was fired after he told other county officials about the work and stated that he was uncomfortable doing it.
Bonnie Garropy is listed as a plaintiff in the suit because she was exposed to asbestos on her husband’s clothes, the suit alleges. The suit also states that she was “deprived of the services, companionship and affection” of her husband because of the damage he suffered from his exposure.

A federal government watchdog group has released a report which states that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) botched asbestos clean-ups at many hazardous sites throughout the country.

An article in the Times of Trenton reports that the group, which is known as the Government Accountability Office (GAO), discovered that the EPA “used outdated testing standards to evaluate more than 260 sites that received tainted vermiculite from a [W.R. Grace] mine in Libby, Montana.”

“The EPA also failed to fully determine the health hazard presented by the asbestos-riddled ore,” said the GAO, which is Congress’ investigatory arm. The GAO report added that once the health risks of the Libby asbestos are determined, the EPA should re-evaluate all of the sites to determine if they continue to pose a hazard, perhaps prompting additional cleanup efforts.

“Since late 1999, EPA has completed evaluations at 266 of the 271 sites thought to have received asbestos-contaminated ore from Libby, Mont., but did so without key information on safe exposure levels to asbestos,” states the report.

The report was compiled at the request of Representative Chris Smith (R-Hamilton, NJ) after the local EPA did a questionable job of cleaning up a Libby site in the town of Hamilton, just outside New Jersey’s capital city of Trenton. Several residents had complained about the EPA’s handling of the contaminated site.

Smith said by using the criteria officials knew to be “outdated and arbitrary,” the EPA had “failed its mission of protecting public health.”

“It’s unconscionable that people vested with protecting the national health would use a totally flawed standard,” Smith said. “I think here and in many parts of the government the public would be shocked that so much of what passes for statistics is not scientifically based.”

A recent story broadcast on CBC News (Canada) announced that Canadian deaths from asbestos exposure are on the rise, with the number of individuals affected by asbestos-related diseases already higher this year than in the last three.

According to the story, Jim Brophy, director of the Occupational Health Clinic for Ontario Workers (OHCOW), said his clinic receives calls nearly every day from workers who are certain they are suffering from some type of asbestos-related health problem. Brophy added that the number of Canadian deaths from asbestos exposure is expected to peak sometime early in the next decade.

Unlike other industrialized countries, however, Canada does not keep track of the number of individuals with asbestos-related diseases.

“We’re probably alone among the industrialized countries in not documenting the extent of the disease and its impact on our society,” he said. “This is the leading cause of occupational disease and occupational mortality in Canada today. Completely under the public health radar in this country.”

Canada is one of the world’s largest producers of asbestos and one of only a handful of industrialized countries that have not banned its use. The government of Canada consistently defends the use of asbestos, noting that the chrysotile form mined in Quebec is “safe” to use.

“There is some propaganda around this subject,” says Clement Godbout, head of the Montreal-based Chrysotile Institute. “There is also commercial interest around this subject. There are lots more dangerous products and substances than chrysotile. For example, in some countries, they are building arms to kill people.”

Many disagree with Godbout. “Because it’s been given up on in so many countries as hopelessly dangerous and unnecessarily so, Canada’s view is very much a minority view,” says American occupational health scientist, Barry Castleman. “It really would be crucial if Canada, instead of pressing for its right to export more asbestos to the local chapters of the asbestos mafia in the Third World, would join the rest of the civilized countries of this world in shutting down the asbestos industry and saying enough’s enough.”

A 50-year-old British woman who was exposed to dangerous asbestos dust as a child has died of mesothelioma at age 50.

According to a report in The Argus, Cheryl Marsh, who served as a police community support office, was diagnosed with the aggressive cancer in 2004 and was awarded £100,000 compensation from a London borough council because she developed the disease from asbestos in the council block where she grew up.

“She used to play in the boiler rooms in the basement of her family’s council flat in Islington when she was 13 years old and was among a group of 20 children who gathered there in the winter evenings,” quotes the article. “The area had been covered in asbestos dust but nobody at the time knew it was dangerous.”

Marsh is believed to have also been exposed to asbestos during her work with the Islington Borough Council social services department, where she came into contact with the dust when stripping down and sanding asbestos brake pads. She also received compensation from the Borough Council because they admitted guilt in regards to her exposure.

In an interview with The Argus earlier this year, Ms Marsh said: “When I found out I had mesothelioma I thought, why me?’ “I didn’t know anything about the disease but when I researched it I discovered it mainly affected men in their 70s who had worked in heavy industries.”

“I can’t do the things I used to, like a full shift on the beat but work is the one thing that keeps me going,” she told the newspaper. “I don’t know how much longer I have. I live each day as it comes. I try to be positive and I hope one day they will come up with a miracle cure.”

Earlier this month, students who live in SUNY (State University of New York) New Paltz’s Crispell Hall dormitory got an e-mail from Crispell Hall Director Bobby Kavathas. It alerted the 250 residents to construction occurring on the campus dorm and said a drape would cover the entire third floor during construction. “Do not tamper with this cover in any way,” it said in all capital letters. Windows were to remain closed at all times, too. “This is for your safety,” Kavathas wrote.

But students at the New Paltz campus remain concerned about exposure to asbestos caused by shoddy construction practices at their dorm, says an article in the Times-Herald Record. While “Danger Asbestos” signs are printed on tape surrounding a cordoned-off dumpster outside the dorm, two chutes descending from the roof of the building are the cause of some concern, say students.

“There is dust coming off the building. There are people on the roof doing removal and it is not contained. It’s definitely going into the atmosphere,” said Jenna Dern, a junior who lives on the first floor of the dorm. “It is really creepy.”

In addition, the high temperatures that occurred last week prompted students to open their windows, allowing potentially dangerous dust to coat objects inside their dormitory rooms.

Campus spokesman Eric Gullickson said students are safe and notes that the asbestos involved in the roof replacement is in the glue under the metal flashings. The old roofing material does not contain asbestos, he said.

“Students have seen dust, but it is coming from the removal of concrete, not asbestos,” Gullickson said. The glue is “non-friable,” meaning it is less likely to break down and get into the air, he pointed out.

Dern notes, however, that non-friable asbestos is more prone to breakdown if it has been exposed to harsh weather and other extremes, such as those that would have occurred on the roof.

It can still get into the air if it is broken or sawed or sanded or cut. “I have heard banging,” from the construction, Dern told the newspaper. “The administration should be more transparent about what construction is going on and what is involved,” she said.

A Michigan man whose father worked for Chrysler Corporation as a metal finisher at their Detroit plant is suing the company and 50 other defendants, claiming he was exposed to asbestos dust brought home on the clothes of his father.

Walter Nalezyty is currently suffering from deadly mesothelioma. He believes that the only way he could have developed the asbestos-caused disease was through contact with his father when he came home from his job at the plant.

Nalezyty did not work for the auto maker but was employed from 1964 through 1991 as a pattern maker and installer at various locations in Michigan and Illinois. His lawyers claim that there was no potential of exposure to asbestos at any of Nalezyty’s places of employment, but that the plaintiff may have also been exposed to asbestos during home renovation projects.

Nalezyty, who was diagnosed with mesothelioma on August 7, recognized that his illness was wrongfully caused, states the claim, which was outlined in the Madison County Record.

The plaintiff also claims that he has sought, but has been unable to obtain full disclosure of relevant documents and information from the defendants leading him to believe the defendants destroyed documents related to asbestos.

“It was foreseeable to a reasonable person/entity in the respective positions of defendants, that said documents and information constituted evidence, which was material to potential civil litigation-namely asbestos litigation,” the complaint states.

Nalezyty seeks compensatory damages in excess of $700,000 as well as punitive damages.

In a campus that has been continuously plagued with asbestos problems caused by old buildings in disrepair, the student publication at Louisiana State University reports that several more occurrences of exposed asbestos have been found since the start of the school year.

An article in the Daily Reveille, the university’s newspaper, reports that numerous renovation projects are generally the reason for the asbestos concerns on the Baton Rouge campus.

“There are more than 300 buildings on campus and any building built between the 1940s and the 1970s might have used asbestos as a building material,” said Michael Hooks, assistant director of Occupational and Environmental Safety. Most dorms, notes the article, were built during this time period, so students are urged to be cautious and report structural damages when they are seen.

“Asbestos was used in installation for floor tile, ceiling tile and fire proofing spray,” Hooks said. “It was used so frequently because it was cheap to abstract and cheap to put into the building.”

Exposed asbestos has already been sighted in numerous buildings on this large campus, including Pleasant Hall, the Veterinary Medicine Building, the Music and Dramatic Arts Building, the Pentagon dorms and McVoy Hall.

Terry Grier, assistant director for Environmental Maintenance, is the campus’s designated asbestos expert. He and his staff follow strict guidelines as to the handling, containment, and removal of the substance. The reason for the overwhelming number of cases of the exposed material, he points out, is due to the fact that extensive renovations are occurring throughout the campus. Grier says he and his team encounter asbestos concerns daily, but students and staff aren’t at risk.

“We know where the asbestos materials are, and we try to keep everybody safe,” Grier said. “If there becomes a problem, we take care of it so no one is exposed to asbestos.”

Lawyers for W.R. Grace & Co. are challenging a high court’s decision that restored criminal charges of “knowing endangerment” to the case against the company and several of its managers.

According to an article in the Missoulian, Grace’s lawyers had indicated that they would indeed fight the recent ruling issued by the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, reversing six decisions that had been handed down last year by Judge Donald Molloy. Molloy’s decisions, said the appellate court, “had eliminated from trial evidence of releases of 95 percent of the contaminants in the Libby vermiculite.”

Lawyers for Grace have requested additional time to petition the court for a rehearing, notes the article. An extension was granted which gives Grace until November 5 to submit documents arguing that the three-judge panel “erred in its findings of fact.” Grace will request either a rehearing before the same three-judge panel, or before the whole court, or both, the article points out.

Last year, defense lawyers argued that prosecutors had waited too long to file criminal charges, therefore exceeding the five-year statute of limitations governing federal criminal prosecutions. Molloy ruled in favor of the chemical company, saying “the government had not alleged any overt criminal acts within the required time frame.”

Just last month, the 9th Circuit Court ruled that “the government had acted quickly to fix the statute-of-limitations problem by submitting a superseding indictment spelling out the overt criminal acts.”

The trial involving Grace and seven of its top executives is scheduled to begin in late winter or early spring of next year.

A steam pipe that burst yesterday in front of Boston’s Edward W. Brooke Courthouse released small amounts of asbestos, reports an article in the Boston Globe.

The fire department of Boston has verified that in addition to large chunks of asphalt, asbestos pieces spewed forth onto the street when the pipe exploded. This was the second such explosion in less than one month in downtown Boston.

“When it ruptured, it blew the steam up through the road,” said Steve MacDonald, spokesman for the department, adding that asbestos was found in the dust and ashpalt that scattered over a 50-foot diameter area and landed on two cars. He said a hazmat team had been called in last night to begin a slow and deliberate cleanup.

Though the steam release occurred in the middle of the afternoon on a warm and busy Sunday, no injuries were reported. A portion of New Chardon Street, however, was closed so that testing and clean-up could be completed and a three-story apartment building was evacuated for safety purposes.

Nancy Sterling, a spokesperson for Trigen-Boston Energy Corp., the company that oversees the 22 miles of pipes beneath the city streets, told the media that asbestos was not released into the air. However, it was found in dust on cars and other objects in the immediate area. The asbestos, Sterling said, came from the material that insulates the pipes.

According to a recent article in the Africa Free Press, tens of thousands of South Africans are currently suffering from asbestos-related diseases.

The article notes that most of the victims hail from small Northern Cape towns, where asbestos mines were the top employer for decades. Though mining companies knew about the dangers of asbestos as early as the 1920s, work in South Africa’s many asbestos mines continued until the mid-1980s. Every year, says the article, many former miners are diagnosed with mesothelioma or asbestosis.

The article also notes that foreign-owned mining companies have, during the past six years, paid out tens of millions of dollars in settlements from which an estimated 10,000 South African victims of asbestos mining have benefited thus far.

Dr. Gideon Smith of the small town of Prieska told the Africa Free Press that he diagnoses approximately five to ten cases per year in his community of about 20,000 residents.

“Every time somebody comes to me with a lung ailment, the first thought is asbestos. It is almost always the case,” said Smith.

Studies note that asbestos-related diseases in Northern Cape mining areas affect as much as 50 percent of the population in these small towns. Yet, says the article, piles of raw asbestos fibers are still dumped and left uncovered, while rehabilitation work has yet to be done on several mine dumps that continue to threaten communities around them.

“Some secondary roads in the province contain asbestos fibers visible to the naked eye, and many schools and homes in towns like Prieska still have asbestos in their frames,” the article points out.

“If this was Europe, huge areas would have to be evacuated. They are not safe for people to live in,” said lawyer Richard Spoor, who has represented dozens of asbestos-related disease sufferers in court.