Fallout from killer asbestos lingers By Jeremy Roberts, The Australian
GARY Beckman remembers asbestos dust hanging in the air when he turned up for work at the BHP shipyards in the South Australian port of Whyalla during the 1970s.
The night before, workers would cover a ship's pipework with asbestos insulation, leaving Mr Beckman and his workmates to inhale the deadly particles the following day.
'You could see it floating in the air and landing on handrails,' Mr Beckman said. Now retired and living in Adelaide, he has the deadly and incurable asbestos-related disease mesothelioma.
Of the known fatalities, 68 former employees at the shipyards have died after confirmed cases of mesothelioma or lung cancer. A further 150 have contracted asbestos-related sickness.
Dock workers exposed to asbestos on navy ship CTV, Canadian Press
HALIFAX — As many as 23 dockyard workers in Halifax were exposed to asbestos onboard a navy supply ship recently after the military failed to warn the shipyard about the hazardous material's existence.
Asbestos disease testing an inexact science By EDDIE CURRAN, MOBILE REGISTER
Guy Wayne Foster, a Theodore man who worked in the testing business for years, testified in a deposition taken as part of a lawsuit against asbestos defendants that there was a 'general knowledge in the field that if someone didn't start working before'74, they wasn't going to be tested.'
That unofficial cut-off point is two years after federal regulations kicked in forcing companies to take measures to limit worker exposure to asbestos.
There are hundreds of occupations that could have resulted in unhealthy levels of asbestos exposure. Because asbestosis is dose-related, certain occupations -- like pipe fitters and shipyard workers -- are more likely than others to develop the illness, usually 15 to 30 years following exposure.
Training ground: Illinois State inmates productive, learn new skills By M.K. Guetersloh
Logan Correctional Center houses inmate teams trained in asbestos removal. Sassatelli said that when a correctional center needs asbestos removed, those inmates are sent there to do the job.