Asbestos HELP

Libby, Montana has become an icon in the story of the destructive power of asbestos. The W.R. Grace Company’s vermiculite mine located there operated until 1990 extracting vermiculite ore that was contaminated with asbestos. The health impact on the community has been long established by a long history of asbestos cancer and other asbestos related diseases occurring at a high rate. The prospect of asbestos liability claims for related illnesses and deaths drove W.R. Grace into bankruptcy.

The federal government has provided emergency medical care for residents in the area along with other support needed by a community suffering from widespread illness and displacement. The EPA has declared the mine a federal Superfund Site, one of the nation’s top priorities for the cleanup of toxic waste. At that point, it seems, things have begun to slow down.

The frustration boiled over Tuesday at a meeting in Libby where federal scientists were long on technical explanations but short on answers about how toxic Libby’s unusual form of asbestos really is. “What is a safe dose for Libby?” Lerah Parker asked. “I want to know when it’s safe to bring my family back to our property.” EPA toxicologist Dave Berry had no answer for her. According to Montana’s Daily InterLake, Ten years ago Parker and her husband, Mel, were forced off their land — the former vermiculite screening plant for W.R. Grace & Co. — and had to close down a thriving nursery business.

Berry was on hand to explain the federal agency’s risk-assessment process for the Libby Superfund site. Risk assessments have been completed for Operable Units 1 and 2, but assessments for other portions of the Superfund site continue. They include the city of Libby, the vermiculite mine site, the former Stimson lumber mill, railroad and highway corridors and the nearby community of Troy.

The federal government mobilizes cleanup efforts once the risk assessment shows one death per 10,000 people, Berry explained. A local writer pointed out that the population of the Libby area is about 10,000 and at least 31 residents have already died from mesothelioma.

Complicating the issue from the EPA’s viewpoint is the fact that the type of asbestos contained in the vermiculite ore was relatively rare in industrial use. Risk assessments for Libby amphibole asbestos — a more deadly needle-sharp fiber than the less-toxic and more common chrysotile asbestos — are based largely on old science, EPA officials admitted.

But the astonishing statistic in all of this is that the epidemiology and toxicology studies of Libby asbestos are a minimum of five years away from being completed. Libby residents feel that the EPA is ignoring other epidemiological studies of asbestos and engaging in an academic exercise that ignores the evidence, provided by the hundreds of local residents who have asbestosis and other related respiratory afflictions.

The Washington Post reports today on a former exhibit specialist who work at the National Air and Space Museum during his 28 year career with the Smithsonian Institute and who developed asbestosis as a result. Richard Pullman, 54, has settled a lawsuit with the institution for $233,000, according to records obtained by The Post this month from the Department of Labor under the Freedom of Information Act.

Pullman said he frequently sawed and drilled into interior walls to install and update exhibits for more than 25 years. In 2008, he and other workers were told for the first time that the walls contained asbestos, Pullman said. Asbestosis, a lung disease linked to breathing asbestos fibers, was diagnosed in Pullman by his physicians.

This story broke in March, causing Smithsonian Secretary G. Wayne Clough to order an investigation of the facility’s potential asbestos exposure by an outside consultant. The Institute chose to make the report public because the Post had obtained a record of the lawsuit settlement during their document search.

The report’s findings include the observation that the Smithsonian failed to keep a complete record on asbestos-containing material. Workers often did not have adequate information on the location of asbestos or how to work around it, according to the report. Workplace exposure has subsequently become an important issue at the museum, in large part due to the news stories.

Pullman asserted that he was often assigned the task of drilling through walls to mount exhibits when those walls contained asbestos or asbestos joint compound. Joint compound used for finishing out wallboard was a widely used asbestos product through the 1970s. In 1992 another consultant retained by the museum reported that there was 1 to 5 percent asbestos in the joint compound used in two dozen Air and Space museum rooms. A level above 1 percent is supposed to trigger worker-safety requirements; the Smithsonian has acknowledged that worker warnings rarely occurred.

The documents obtained by the Post show a pattern of non-concern on the part of Smithsonian’s management. The 2007 plans to replace the electrical system misled contractors about the amount of asbestos found in the walls. The museum maintained asbestos levels were less than one percent, at that time. Pullman collected dust samples from the museum that showed high levels of asbestos content.