# Company knows they did wrong



## Majewski (Jan 8, 2016)

Jhellwig said:


> I will start with the backstory on this first.
> 
> A few weeks ago our buildings and grounds guys were removing some window pains in a ww2 era building. They were removing the window glazing with a needle gun and air chisel making a lot of dust. We were working right next to them and joked with the b&g guys about the yummy asbestos. It did have .5% non friable asbestos in it. After they did all that the next day they told us according to Osha we can not handle any acm whatsoever. The job should have been remediated first. Everyone laughed it off and went about their work. A couple of weeks ago the one guy that likes to argue about dumb stuff in meetings (compressed air guy) went off the deep end about the asbestos in an environmental training(inappropriately and he wasn't even there when the work was done) and went and yelled at saftey about it.
> 
> ...


Seems like they want to protect themselves to me. Seems like few people aren't the brightest bulbs in the bunch and now someone/somewhere they want to cya because of it.


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## Jhellwig (Jun 18, 2014)

They got rid of the saftey manager that caused their last osha fine.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Jhellwig said:


> They got rid of the saftey manager that caused their last osha fine.


A performance that they may repeat again soon.


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## Majewski (Jan 8, 2016)

MechanicalDVR said:


> A performance that they may repeat again soon.


Took the words out of my mouth.... I felt like saying Heads will roll.
Someone always has to get their pound of flesh.


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## Jhellwig (Jun 18, 2014)

I am just glad they are handing out golden tickets. Now once I make them change the wording we will be all good. They wouldn't give out these letters that essentially write a blank check if they were in the right. This is just trying to make a mends so that hopefully no one rats to osha.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Jhellwig said:


> I am just glad they are handing out golden tickets. Now once I make them change the wording we will be all good. They wouldn't give out these letters that essentially write a blank check if they were in the right. This is just trying to make a mends so that hopefully no one rats to osha.


Standard 'put it off' defense, planning on your guys passing away from a heart condition before you get asbestosis.


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## chrisfnl (Sep 13, 2010)

Non-friable is only non-friable if it's not disturbed/modified...


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## Southeast Power (Jan 18, 2009)

How did we survive all of those years cutting through lead paint and asbestos products?


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Suncoast Power said:


> How did we survive all of those years cutting through lead paint and asbestos products?


Luck of the draw. I used to mix asbestos cement for boiler insulation and pipe fittings by hand in a wheelbarrow as a child. I also cut asbestos sheets with a power saw for wall and ceiling coverage. So far so good. Maybe not ever being a smoker helped my cause.


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## HackWork (Oct 2, 2009)

Suncoast Power said:


> How did we survive all of those years cutting through lead paint and asbestos products?


Many people didn't survive.


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## Southeast Power (Jan 18, 2009)

MechanicalDVR said:


> Luck of the draw. I used to mix asbestos cement for boiler insulation and pipe fittings by hand in a wheelbarrow as a child. I also cut asbestos sheets with a power saw for wall and ceiling coverage. So far so good. Maybe not ever being a smoker helped my cause.


I think once the lung disease battle was heaped on the tobacco industry, they brought about the awareness of other causes of lung disease.
Maybe everyone just thought you had lung cancer only due to smoking.


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## chicken steve (Mar 22, 2011)

Personally , i like '_safe_' , but need no more evidence towards my assumption that anything in this country legislated '_safety_' is only looking out for $$$, not us....~CS~


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## HackWork (Oct 2, 2009)

chicken steve said:


> Personally , i like '_safe_' , but need no more evidence towards my assumption that anything in this country legislated '_safety_' is only looking out for $$$, not us....~CS~


You mean like 73.854% of the National Electrical Code®? :whistling2:


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## Wirenuting (Sep 12, 2010)

Asbestos is always non-friable until it is disturbed improperly. 
Just because the ACM was old window caulk does not make it safe. Once you begin to chip, needle gun or remove it improperly, exposure was a forgone conclusion. 

Think of it this way, 9x9 asphalt floor tile has asbestos in it.. It becomes friable as soon as you break it up off the floor. Window caulk is the same.


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## JRaef (Mar 23, 2009)

I did a lot of work on autoclaves, the big steam chambers used for sterilizing stuff in hospitals and labs. Old ones were usually wrapped with thick asbestos insulation pads with cutouts for the steam pipes and conduits, I probably did 10 - 12 of them over the course of 5 years because that was my father's business and I did it as side work. We rebuilt the controls on them, which also mean redoing the steam piping to add motorized valves etc. So we would strip those asbestos pads off piece by piece, sometimes with scrapers because they were usually baked on with crud. Friable? Hell, it was so thick we wore safety goggles to keep it out of our eyes, but no dust masks. This was just before the big scares. 



I've spoken with my doc about it several times and he says I likely have asbestosis, but I'll also likely die of something else long before that kills me. My point is, a one-shot or even lightly repeated exposure is not the immediate killer it gets made out to be. It's the long term every day exposure that is the problem. I had friends who worked at a Johns Manville plant where they make asbestos insulation, they were all dead by age 50, including some of their wives because they would wash their clothes every day. I had another friend who was a psychologist for the State and worked in an old building that had rockbestos air ducts, he made it to 65, but died last year of lung cancer caused by his asbestosis after being unable to work for the past 20 years (never smoked in his entire life). So it's serious for sure, but in my opinion, not so serious to freak out over after one exposure. Nobody knows exactly WHAT level of exposure is going to be too much, so everyone errs on the safe side though.


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