• Teacher dies of asbestos poisoning after pinning students work to contaminated walls
    37 replies, posted
[quote]Marion Potts taught in schools in Britain and Norway for over 25 years The 63-year-old [b]contracted mesothelioma, an asbestos-related cancer She died in June after taking ill-health retirement in 2012 It is not known which school would have exposed Mrs Potts to lethal fibres[/b] Over 140 UK teachers have died of the disease in the past ten years Southampton Coroner's Court heard that Mrs Potts, known as Jane to friends, [b]was likely to have breathed in the deadly substance while pinning pupils' work up on classroom walls. The 63-year-old died in hospital in June after a lengthy battle with the disease which is known to have a prolonged onset.[/b][/quote] Source: [url]http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2514958/Caring-teacher-died-exposed-asbestos-hanging-pupils-work-contaminated-classroom-walls-25-years.html[/url] She was one of my old English teachers at the school I used to go to. Strict, but because she cared about us and was passionate about the subject. I heard about 2 years ago that she had cancer and had retired because of it, and a few months ago I heard that she'd passed away. Now this. She will be missed.
I'm sorry to hear that. It's scary to think you could work somewhere all of your life and not realize you are taking in heavy doses of carcinogens or harmful chemicals that have been there as long as the building has.
[quote]Over 140 UK teachers have died of the disease in the past ten years[/quote] Is asbestos still legal in the UK or something? Or are schools just too cheap to have it removed?
[QUOTE=Mr. Someguy;43011156]Is asbestos still legal in the UK or something? Or are schools just too cheap to have it removed?[/QUOTE] The latter.
[QUOTE=Juggernog;43011169]The latter.[/QUOTE] Only the high risk stuff is removed apparently.
[QUOTE=Mr. Someguy;43011156]Is asbestos still legal in the UK or something? Or are schools just too cheap to have it removed?[/QUOTE] It's costly to have it removed. It was in our music block in my school, and it was only covered over and sealed with a sticking saying "Asbestos, Danger"
[QUOTE=Mr. Someguy;43011156]Is asbestos still legal in the UK or something? Or are schools just too cheap to have it removed?[/QUOTE] The article says [quote]'The best thing to do is to have it totally removed but the government doesn’t want to pay for it. 'It would create jobs as well as protect staff and youngsters. 'Westminster will pay to have it removed from the Houses of Parliament but not from schools, it seems.' [b]Asbestos was widely used in the UK as a building material up until 1985 when the use of most types was banned. It was completely banned from new buildings in 1999.[/b][/quote]
I've been working on lights for my school's show, and literally upstairs I am right below exposed asbestos, and a bloody lot of it. Scared now.
Yeah, there was loads of asbestos in my old college, there was stickers all over the ceiling warning people about it. A year after I left they just ended up tearing the building down and replaced it with a Sainsbury's :v:
[QUOTE=Mr. Someguy;43011156]Is asbestos still legal in the UK or something? Or are schools just too cheap to have it removed?[/QUOTE] A lot of the time, no one knows where it is till it's been disturbed, once it's been found it's generally removed or it's made as safe as possible till a time where it can be removed, it costs a lot of money unfortunately and our government does not really give a shit about it enough to pay for it's removal.
Asbestos is some serious shit.
They made fire suits out of asbestos in the 1930's.
I've worked as a manager in an asbestos-decontamination firm in Sweden for a few years and the public does not seem to understand how big a problem asbestos actually is. As a result of very few governments taking it seriously asbestos related deaths have been on a rise for quite some time here in Europe; and the problem is that since it's not chemical but physical (it's basically very very small particles of different minerals) it has a tendency to stay around when it gets loosened from it's glue. Technically speaking you'd have to lock down that whole school now to sanitize it, since the only way asbestos particles go away is if they get stuck in something (they stick to the walls of the lungs, which causes small sores to which the body's response is to try and heal it, and due to the lungs moving as we breathe the sore keeps reopening, creating a cyst which is sometimes malignant, aka the cancer mesothelioma mentioned in this case), and the scary thing is that you only need to be exposed to it once and have some bad luck to get really sick from it. Back in the good old days when companies just tore asbestos from the walls to "sanitize it" (companies that work for a cheap buck still does this, so if you hire a company to remove asbestos from your house make sure they're serious or they will contaminate your whole house) and workers would often survive (since it's basically a question about luck), but bring asbestos home on their clothes and infect their children/relatives/spouses, killing them instead. Sorry for the long un-paragraphed post. If anyone has any questions on the topic of asbestos and it's decontamination feel free to ask. [QUOTE=Griffster26;43011755]They made fire suits out of asbestos in the 1930's.[/QUOTE] In the US the legality of asbestos is still in question; the navy for instance still uses it in the construction of their ships (especially around the generators/engine/boiler/propulsion rooms), so it's not uncommon for US Navy Engineers to contract asbestos related diseases. You can find more info on the effects of asbestos more or less being legal in the US here: [url]http://www.ewg.org/asbestos/facts/fact1.php[/url]
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;43011440]I've been working on lights for my school's show, and literally upstairs I am right below exposed asbestos, and a bloody lot of it. Scared now.[/QUOTE] I wouldn't go up there to be honest. I'm the same when I'm landscaping peoples gardens' and there is always the old asbesdos shed roof that needs to be removed, we just get professionals in to deal with it.
Honestly the UK government should set up a program to remove all Asbestos completely, people in Australia are doing it and in fact last month my school demolished a whole entire building because the ceiling was starting to expose itself and above was a ton of asbestos
My high school was flooded once due to a really stupid grad prank and apparently because it's a really old building which still used asbestos no one was allowed back in it until it was completely cleaned and removed of water for health reasons.
A few years back, I was in a little outbuilding of our school, which was a tiny weights room. Used to go there a lot, but on this particular day some guy in the year above me punched a hole in the ceiling, causing all these fibers to burst out and fill the room The teacher returned and told everyone to get out, the next day the gym was shut for good So all that time I've potentially been breathing in asbestos fibers
When they decided to rebuild my old high schoo, I remember seeing "DANGER ASBESTOS" signs and sealed entrances everywhere trying to get the building prepped for demolition. All while we still had classes. :v:
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;43011440]I've been working on lights for my school's show, and literally upstairs I am right below exposed asbestos, and a bloody lot of it. Scared now.[/QUOTE] If I recall you should be able to refuse to work until you're given proper safety gear to work with it
Guess she couldn't handle [I]the active room[/I] [video=youtube;dPof1LYvaI8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPof1LYvaI8[/video]
Makes you wonder what we use now will end up killing us I breathe in some nasty shit at work sometimes
[QUOTE=jaredop;43013809]Makes you wonder what we use now will end up killing us I breathe in some nasty shit at work sometimes[/QUOTE] We have this magnesol dust at work for filtering the bad shit out of the oil. Goes in the bottom of the filters. One of my colleagues if a fucking moron and tips the back from like 2 meters up, gets the dust all through the entire section of the store he's in. I hope he enjoys his lung cancer. Twat.
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;43011440]I've been working on lights for my school's show, and literally upstairs I am right below exposed asbestos, and a bloody lot of it. Scared now.[/QUOTE] In order for you to get some asbestos related lung disease, you must be exposed to moderate amounts of it in the air for a prolonged period of time. Brief exposure of a small puff of it most likely won't cause any problems due to the fact the lungs have a mucous coating that is constantly being cycled up the trachea and down into the stomach. Some precautions to take would be to not disturb the asbestos insulation unless absolutely necessary. Wear a thick dust mask at all times and wash any clothes that you wear while near asbestos separately from other clothes to prevent cross contamination. The dust mask won't catch everything, but it help. Also make sure that it's really asbestos that you're looking at. Asbestos insulation is almost always a chalk white color like this: [img]http://images.dexknows.com/cms/How_to_Identify_Asbestos_4708976_460.jpg[/img] And it doesn't burn. You can grab a small tuft of the insulation, and try to burn it for a prolonged period of time. If it melts, it's fiberglass and if it eventually burns then it's probably some form of cellulose doped in fire retardant.
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;43011440]I've been working on lights for my school's show, and literally upstairs I am right below exposed asbestos, and a bloody lot of it. Scared now.[/QUOTE] Good news is that asbestos related cancer and diseases are apparently very unlikely to happen unless you are exposed to it long term. Apparently even high-dosage amounts in one burst are unlikely to cause issues - its the exposure and build up of them in your lungs that does it. The popular theory is that the fibers are so sharp and small they literally damage the cells in such a way to cause cancer to form after a while.
UK get your shit together :/
[QUOTE=godinthehouse;43011440]I've been working on lights for my school's show, and literally upstairs I am right below exposed asbestos, and a bloody lot of it. Scared now.[/QUOTE] Careful up there man. This is quite a nasty micro-epidemic.
My school is still built with asbestos, it's in the walls, floors, ceilings, everywhere, there are no signs, the only things covering them are cheap stacks of chipboard or something that you can basically punch though without much effort Nobody will replace it, far too costly apparently.
[QUOTE=PrusseLusken;43015972]Undisturbed asbestos isn't harmful in any way, it's first when it's moved around, broken, or split that the fibres get loose and can get into your lungs. Leaving the asbestos plates UNDISTURBED in old buildings is safer and cheaper than removing them..[/QUOTE] yeah but as soon as a wall gets damaged and exposed you have a quarantine situation on your hands
[QUOTE=PrusseLusken;43015972]Undisturbed asbestos isn't harmful in any way, it's first when it's moved around, broken, or split that the fibres get loose and can get into your lungs. Leaving the asbestos plates [B]UNDISTURBED in old buildings is safer[/B] and cheaper than removing them..[/QUOTE] Many of the UK's schools are old buildings, you'd be surprised at just how often a fist or a foot goes through a wall or ceiling. It's far safer to have it removed from schools because kids and teenagers are idiots and unpredictable, even if they know asbestos is there.
Yeah most of the walls were made from 1mm thick plaster. The gym in my old school had to be rebuilt because the footballs hitting the walls etc were disturbing the asbestos and apparently it started falling from the ceiling
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