The wife of a former Navy firefighter who passed away from an asbestos-related cancer was awarded nearly $2.6 million after a two-month trial concluded March 12, 2009.

Port Orange, Florida resident Gail Fortier will receive $2,595,000 from Allis-Chalmers Corp. Fortier’s husband, David, died at the age of 59 as a result of mesothelioma, a rare cancer caused almost exclusively by asbestos exposure.

Mesothelioma develops from the inhalation or ingestion of toxic asbestos fibers, however, not everyone who is exposed to asbestos will contract this aggressive cancer. The hazardous fibers can become lodged in organs, causing inflammation or infection which can lead to the development of an asbestos-related disease such as mesothelioma. A mesothelioma prognosis is generally poor because patients typically do not demonstrate symptoms of the cancer for 20 to 50 years after the initial exposure to asbestos occurred.

David worked on the USS Forrestal aircraft carrier as a fireman for the majority of his service in the United States Navy, which lasted from 1969 to 1972. The USS Forrestal was constructed at Newport News Shipbuilding, a shipyard known to have used asbestos-contaminated materials in the creation of ships and vessels in Virginia. According to Gail’s attorney, David worked on pumps and other equipment heavily insulated with asbestos while serving on the ship. The products were manufactured by Allis-Chalmers.

Allis-Chalmers was formerly one of the largest and most diverse American manufacturing companies. Currently based in Houston, Texas the company is now known as Allis-Chalmers Energy and describes itself as a multi-faceted oilfield services company.

Asbestos-contaminated materials were commonly used in the construction of aircraft carriers crafted prior to 1970. The mineral’s innate resistance to heat and fire made it ideal for use in insulation or products located in engine rooms. Asbestos fibers can still be found in some naval ships, as the mineral may be imbedded in gaskets, boilers, brakes and older construction materials.

Fortier was diagnosed with mesothelioma in October 2006 and filed a lawsuit in December that same year. He passed away June 20, 2008.

The six-person jury deliberated for less than a day and a half after the two-month trial concluded. The trial took place before Judge David Tobin in Connecticut and is the first asbestos-related case to go to verdict in Connecticut in 20 years. The Fortiers were former residents of Connecticut.

Additional information about mesothelioma can be found through the Mesothelioma Cancer Center.

New Haven, Connecticut – The Mayor of New Haven, Connecticut is considering suing those responsible for mishandling asbestos during an abatement project, as problems created by the mishandling may mean the city cannot collect nearly $1 million in reimbursement for the work.

Mayor John M. Picard hopes to try and change the state’s mind about what costs the state is willing to reimburse, and plans to use litigation as a last resort to try and recoup the money spent on the project.

Picard plans to try all possible methods to ensure the city is reimbursed, saying, “I want the taxpayers to know that litigation is possible. I’m not going to stop until we get reimbursed one way or the other.”

The state has so far agreed to reimburse the city $955,000 for asbestos abatement completed several years ago at West Haven High School. However, the state has also said that $1.2 million of the $2.5 million spent is ineligible for reimbursement.

According to the state, costs are not reimbursable if there is no evidence of a public bid for the work, no plan review, inadequate documentation for the work, and no submitted charge orders.

The problem arises from the fact that the project to remove and replace the asbestos-containing façade of West Haven High School ended up almost twice as large as originally planned.

Partly due to those initial miscalculations over the size of the project, it was expanded without the extra paperwork which would have preserved the project’s full eligibility for reimbursement.  Some of the work was carried out to address air quality issues at the school.

Picard says he will first attempt to convince the state to reconsider what costs are eligible for reimbursement. To facilitate this, members of West Haven’t state delegation will ask the state to extend the deadline for seeking reimbursement for the work. The city has already sent last-minute documents which might make an additional $375,000 eligible for state reimbursement.

Litigation will be a last resort. At this stage Picard has declined to name any people or companies that might be named in a lawsuit.

However, Building Oversight Committee Chairman Kenneth Carney has said that litigation will target “whoever is responsible for allowing work to proceed without it going out to bid and without filling out proper paperwork to get state reimbursement.” Likely targets may include contractors who carried out the work, or individuals involved in bidding out the contracts.

It seems there’s no end to the troubles for schools that are plagued by asbestos issues. Asbestos exposure presents severe health risks, and removing asbestos is an expensive problem for many schools, but it’s a problem that just won’t go away.

In Danbury, Connecticut, asbestos was discovered in a bathroom at Hayestown Avenue School, when workers arrived to fix a leaking toilet. Children were no doubt delighted that school was out for a couple of days, but for the school, it’s a headache due to the extra expense of sealing or removing the asbestos.

Luckily for this school, air tests carried out after the asbestos was found showed that there were no airborne asbestos fibers present, even though a small amount of the asbestos-present on pipe insulation-was disturbed.

The school sent a letter home to parents, stating that “As a precautionary measure, even though the incident was confined to an isolated area and the disturbance minimal by regulatory standards, air samples were taken in five locations, including adjacent rooms and corridors. The results of our testing has shown that there was no release of fibers in any of the areas tested, including the location that the work was being performed.”

This school has gotten off relatively easily-the cost of fixing the problem will be minimal, and the only disruption will be that the last day of school will come a day late, due to the need to make up the lost time.

The problem is a little bigger in East Liverpool, Ohio, where a school administration building has severe problems with asbestos, damp, and electrical issues. Several classes are held in the building, which also houses a number of school administrative staff.

The real problem, however, is that even though the present of asbestos and other problems makes the building an unhealthy environment, the money isn’t there to relocate staff and students, or take care of the building’s problems.

Asbestos abatement is an expensive business-it requires professionally trained workers, and the costs of disposing of asbestos waste is about three times higher than the cost of disposing the non-hazardous materials.

Another problem for the school is that abandoning the building in favor of one more suitable means that the clock would start ticking, and the school would be required to either sell the building, or demolish it-and both options would likely require asbestos abatement to be carried out beforehand.

Asbestos certainly complicates issues for many schools-if it becomes unsafe it’s expensive to remove, and for schools that are already having funding issues, the problems caused by asbestos can become a nightmare.

Milford, Connecticut – Many schools are closed this week for Spring Break, and some are taking advantage of the down time to bring contractors in for asbestos removal. In Milford, Connecticut, two schools are doing just that, hoping to get a jump-start on renovations planned for the summer.

Asbestos problems in schools are often in the news. Many such stories appear when a school is carrying out asbestos abatement during the semester, when kids are in the school. One such incident occurred at another Connecticut school last month. Asbestos was discovered at Bethel High during abatement and renovations, and the school was closed for several days while testing was carried out.

Being able to carry out abatement during a vacation week is a big advantage for schools, which must be able to ensure that removal of asbestos doesn’t pose any dangers to children and teachers. The Bethel High incident illustrates how difficult a problem this can be: the incident was caused by the breakage of a table that had not been known to contain asbestos until the incident occurred.

For officials at Jonathan Law and Foran High Schools, getting the abatement work done during a vacation week is even more important, because renovations are planned at both schools during summer vacation, and getting the asbestos removal done now allows for more time later.

Asbestos and lead abatement at the schools will cost an estimated $1.2 million. The renovations, which will cost around $6 million, are badly needed, says Phillip Russell, Deputy Superintendent of Operations. “Everything’s old—the plumbing, the burners. We have to change out the plumbing before it starts leaking.”

Jonathan Law was built in 1961 and Foran High School in 1973. The schools have been updated little since then, and since those decades were part of the peak period of asbestos use in America, they both need considerable abatement work done.

In schools, asbestos was used as thermal and acoustical insulation, as well as a flame and fire retardant. The toxic substance may be in walls, ceilings, and floors, around furnaces, boilers, and pipes, and in tables, burner pads, and other equipment in science laboratories.

Contractors working in Jonathan Law and Foran High Schools this week hope to finish the work by Thursday. Once the work has been completed, air samples will be taken and tested to make sure it’s safe for students to come back to school.

March 18, 2008 - Schools such as Asa Wood Elementary School in Libby, Montana, Bethel High School in Connecticut, and Mokelumne River School in Lodi, California have been in the news recently over asbestos-related issues. However, they’re by no means the only schools that have been having asbestos problems in the last few months.

While the schools of Libby definitely have more to be worried about, there are many other schools where asbestos has become a problem.

In the last couple of days alone, several schools have reported discovering deposits of asbestos-containing materials, or have published plans for management of existing asbestos materials.

Among them are Gibson City School in Gibson City, Illinois, Falmouth High School in Falmouth, Massachusetts, Harding High School in Warren, Ohio, Bancroft School in Swea City, Minnesota, and Main Street Middle School in Montpelier, Vermont.

Each of the schools is planning asbestos abatement activities to ensure the school remains safe for students. In some cases there are other problems, such as mold, making students and teachers sick.

In the case of Harding High School, the situation is somewhat different. Parts of the school are intended to be demolished, but asbestos abatement must be carried out before demolition can occur.

Abatement activities for these types of projects are typically expensive, and many schools are feeling the pinch. Even smaller projects can cost several thousand dollars. In the case of Mokelumne River School, for example, the cost of clean-up of a relatively small area was expected to reach $50,000. It’s not uncommon for the cost of larger asbestos abatement projects to run to several hundred thousand dollars.

Over the next several years increasing numbers of schools are likely to face asbestos problems. The mineral substance was widely used in construction materials from the 1940s to the 1980s, and those materials were used in both private and public buildings. Schools were certainly no exception, and unfortunately today’s students and school employees are paying the price for the enormously widespread use of asbestos in those five decades.

As these asbestos-containing materials age and deteriorate, needed repairs and renovations will uncover pockets of asbestos that need to be removed, potentially disrupting education for children in those schools. More importantly, health hazards are a very real possibility.

The EPA has taken steps to deal with the issue by requiring all schools that contain asbestos to formulate an asbestos management plan. The plan must indicate where in the school asbestos is located, as well as the condition of the asbestos-containing materials, and a description of the steps taken to prevent exposure from occurring. Parents of students who attend schools where asbestos is present can ask to see a copy of their school’s management plan at any time. School employees also have a right to view the plan.

Bethel, Connecticut– On Thursday March 7 2008 students of Bethel High School were sent home early following an incident in which a table top located in the school’s science lab was broken. The incident had occurred two days earlier, on Tuesday evening.

The table top was known to contain asbestos, a fire-retardant material that was commonly used in construction prior to the 1980s. Exposure to asbestos is known to cause diseases such as asbestosis and mesothelioma, both of which are incurable and ultimately lethal.

The incident occurred during an asbestos abatement project carried out by Eagle Environmental. Workers were removing asbestos materials from the school laboratory when the table top was broken.

Following the incident an air sample was initiated and clean-up work started immediately. The contaminated area was isolated and air filtration and wet removal procedures were carried out to reduce the contamination danger. Following clean-up procedures another air sample was taken.

The initial sample taken indicated an elevated asbestos level, however the sample taken following clean-up indicated that airborne asbestos levels had decreased to state DPH standards for sites undergoing asbestos abatement.

Both air samples were sent for further laboratory analysis, and the state DPH ordered the school closed until the results of both tests confirmed that asbestos concentrations were at safe levels.

School Superintendent Gary Chesley has said that school officials were not convinced that the elevated asbestos levels were the result of the table incident. Bethel High School will remain closed through Friday so that a larger area of the abatement site can be tested for air quality.

The state Department of Health will send a representative to oversee the air quality tests, and will review responses to the incident that occurred on Tuesday, including the delay between the incident occurring and the closure of the school.

The issue of asbestos in schools is likely to become an increasingly widespread problem. Asbestos was used in a variety of building materials between the 1940s and 1980s, due to the substance’s excellence as a fire-retardant, insulator, and acoustic barrier. As asbestos-containing materials age, repairs and renovations may cause disturbance to asbestos materials. These types of disturbances can potentially present a health hazard if proper procedures are not followed to limit exposure.

To deal with asbestos in schools, the EPA requires that all schools that contain asbestos maintain a management plan that details the location of asbestos, its condition, and the measures taken to prevent exposure. In schools where asbestos is present, parents and school employees can request to see a copy of the asbestos management plan at any time.

This is the second time in just over a month that the school’s routine has been disturbed by an asbestos-related incident. On February 6 students were sent home early following the exposure of asbestos-containing fireproofing materials. Workers who were renovating had accidentally opened a wall cavity and exposed the material. Air quality tests that were carried out following the incident were normal.

BETHEL, Connecticut – Bethel High School students will have another day off from school Friday morning when the state Department of Health monitors air quality tests being done there as a follow-up to an asbestos release that happened Tuesday night. The department will also be reviewing the response to Tuesday’s incident.

William Gerrish, a Department of Health spokesman, said that the department’s focus is to be certain that there will be proper assessment and clean-up. The agency will be reviewing the situation and determining if appropriate steps were taken to ameliorate the risk and safeguard the students and staff at the high school.

According to accounts of the incident, Eagle Environmental is working on an asbestos abatement project as part of the high school’s renovation. On Tuesday evening, according to a letter from the Health Department which Eagle Environmental faxed to school Principal Pat Consentino, workers dropped a science lab tabletop which broke in front of one of the classrooms. Workers immediately took an air quality sample and did an on-the-spot test, which showed elevated levels of asbestos in the area.

The workers immediately cleaned the area and took a second air sample, which showed decreased asbestos levels – levels which were within the Department of Health standard for re-occupancy of an area after asbestos abatement.

Since the second air sample showed decreased levels, Eagle Environmental did not notify school officials about the incident. Instead, they sent the two air sample tests to a lab for further analysis. The results for the first air sample test arrived Wednesday evening, confirming the heightened asbestos levels immediately after the table was dropped. The results of the second air sample test were not expected until Thursday evening.

Based on the results of the first sample, the health department informed Eagle Environmental that the school should be closed and no students allowed on the premises until a second air quality test showed clean air.

School Superintendent Gary Chesley said that school officials aren’t convinced that the dropped table top incident was the source of the elevated asbestos levels. Chesley said that a Thursday afternoon meeting between school department officials and Eagle Environmental shed some doubt on that version of events.

Ray Folino of Eagle Environmental said that school was not closed Wednesday because of the second test that showed clean air conditions, but that there are protocols to follow and sometimes the protocols kick in “after the samples are analyzed”, but still must be followed. The school was closed Thursday, he said, strictly as a precautionary measure.

Chelsey and First Selectman decided to close the high school on Friday as well in order to test the entire area. Says Chelsey, “I don’t care what the test results are, frankly. I want to make sure the place is 100 percent clean.”

He also said that both Eagle Environmental and the First Selectman have assured him that in the future, he will be notified immediately if asbestos is released at the high school.

Asbestos fibers, which are about one thousandth the thickness of a human hair, can float in the air for hours after being disturbed in any way. Once inhaled, they may remain in the body for decades, and cause lung scarring, asbestosis and mesothelioma, a rare cancer that is found almost exclusively in those who have been exposed to asbestos.

March 14, 2008, Stratford, Connecticut - The ongoing battle between the Environmental Protection Agency and Stratford residents over the final resting place of some 10,000 cubic yards of toxic waste continues, as three Stratford state representatives have sponsored a bill that may block the EPA’s intentions.

The waste includes asbestos as well as lead and PCB compounds, and has so far intended to be buried at EPA waste-storage locations in Stratford. These sites currently hold waste excavated by the EPA during a toxic-waste cleanup that ended in 1999.

The first cleanup involved cleaning and rehabilitation of the Raymark Brake manufacturing company, a site now inhabited by a shopping center. The waste that was removed from the Raymark site was buried and capped at two different sites that are located very close to residential areas.

Capping involves covering the waste with a layer of waterproof material, then covering the material with layers of soil. The final layer is asphalt or turf.

The EPA is currently considering locations to dispose of the current load of asbestos-containing waste excavated from a total of 46 sites in Stratford. One option involves opening up the two previous disposal sites to add the new load of waste. Other options include capping the waste in its current location, or moving it to national waste disposal sites located out of town.

Stratford residents are worried that the EPA seems to prefer the option that involves opening up the two current waste disposal sites to add the new load of asbestos, lead, and PCBs. The two current disposal sites are located close to residential areas, and residents of those areas are very concerned about the potential future effects on their health and property values.

In response to the situation, three of Stratford’s state representatives have written and sponsored a bill that, if passed, may help prevent the EPA dumping the waste near Stratford residential communities.

State Senator Dan Debicella and state Representatives John Harkins and Larry Miller wrote the bill, known as HB5606, An Act Prohibiting the Disposal or Storage of Toxic Waste Near Residential Property. If passed, HB5606 will prevent the EPA opening up the two existing waste disposal sites to add the new load of waste.

HB5606 recently passed the Environmental Committee, mainly on the basis of testimony from concerned Stratford residents. The next step, says Dan Debicella, is to have the bill brought to the General Assembly floor for voting.

The EPA is expected to decide on the final disposal location of the waste over the summer.

March 14, 2008, Bethel, Connecticut - Bethel High School has tested as clear of asbestos fibers a week after an asbestos incident outside a school laboratory.

The incident occurred on the evening of March 4, when construction workers dropped and broke a table top that had been located in the science laboratory. Immediately following the incident, air tests showed elevated levels of asbestos. Reports of the incident indicate that airborne asbestos levels had decreased to normal (as defined by the state Department of Public Health) by the time the incident had been cleaned up.

Cleanup started immediately following the incident, and involved isolating the contaminated area, filtering the air in the area, and using wet removal procedures to reduce the danger of further contamination while removing the asbestos-containing table top.

The DPH had ordered closure of the school as a precautionary measure, however. Students were sent home on the Thursday morning following the incident, and the school was closed for further air testing last Friday to test a larger area surrounding the abatement site, and to confirm that airborne asbestos had in fact dropped to safe levels.

School Superintendent Gary Chesley says that nonstop monitoring of the incident site indicates there have been no lasting problems. Next week, however, the Department of Public Health’s Toxicology Division will also report on the level of expected risk for students who passed through the nearby stairwell.

This is the second time in just six weeks that the school’s routine has been disturbed by an asbestos-related incident. Students were sent home early on February 6 after asbestos-containing fireproofing materials were accidentally exposed by workers who were renovating in the area. Air quality tests that were carried out following the incident were normal.

The issue of asbestos in schools is likely to become an increasingly widespread problem due to the widespread use of asbestos in construction between the 1940s and 1980s. As asbestos-containing materials age, repairs and renovations may cause disturbance to asbestos materials. These types of disturbances can potentially present a health hazard if proper procedures are not followed to limit exposure.

The EPA requires that all schools that contain asbestos create a management plan with details about the location of asbestos, its condition, and what has been done to prevent exposure. Parents and school employees can request to see a copy of the asbestos management plan.

The Bethel High School District’s web site reports that if any unacceptable readings are taken the school will again be closed immediately. Eagle Environmental, the company that has been carrying out the asbestos abatement project in the school, monitors air quality daily between noon and 8pm in all areas occupied by students.

BRANFORD, Connecticut – Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical school are among those using Roche Applied Science’s 454 Life Sciences, to characterize the mutations in genes unique to pleural mesothelioma. The study at Brigham and Women’s used the proprietary 454 Life Sciences long-read sequencing technology to make note of specific gene mutations in four patients with mesothelioma.

The study appeared Wednesday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researchers are part of The International Mesothelioma Program, whose main aim is to understand what causes the development of mesothelioma in the hopes of finding improved and newer treatments and therapy.

The results of this study could have far-reaching implications in deciding the future course of treatment not only for those with mesothelioma, but for those suffering from other cancers as well.

The researchers used Ultra-Deep 454 Sequencing to picture the full complement of individual tumor mutations in genes expressed from four malignant pleural mesothelioma genes and two controls. They found 15 different mutations among the four mesothelioma samples. They represent multiple types of mutations. The 454 Sequencing system offers up to 96% sensitivity and 100% specificity.

Dr. David Sugarbaker, lead author of the study is the founder of the International Mesothelioma Program, and Chief of the Division of Thoracic Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He believes that this approach, involving the profiling and sub-typing of cell mutations in cancer patients, may form the basis of a new type of therapy in which treatments are specifically tailored to each individual patient based on their own cancer profile.

Christopher MacLeod, president and CEO of 454 Life Sciences said that the company is pleased to see the Genome Sequencer being used to improve our understanding of mesothelioma. 454 Life Sciences develops and commercializes the Genome Sequencer System, which is far easier to use than other similar systems and may eventually form the basis for an entire new system of treatment for mutating diseases like pleural mesothelioma.

Malignant mesothelioma is a cancer of the lining of the lungs, heart or abdominal cavity that is caused by exposure to asbestos. Because of its long latency period – up to several decades – and the similarity of its early symptoms to other illnesses, mesothelioma is often undiagnosed until it reaches the later stages. It is considered to be a rapidly progressive and aggressive cancer that often kills patients within a few months after diagnosis. Because it is a rare cancer with about 3,000 new mesothelioma cases diagnosed annually, there is little impetus for drug and pharmaceutical companies to invest in research to develop drugs to fight it specifically. This new study suggests that individual therapy may be exactly what is needed in fighting this devastating killer.