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A man diagnosed with asbestosis filed the first asbestos lawsuit in 1966, but the dangers of asbestos were not fully recognized until the late 1970s. Asbestos was widely used, with the mineral''s sturdy, fire-resistant, pliable fibers found in industries across America. Insulation, automobile brakes, shingles, paper, plastics, flooring, glue, tennis court coating, as well as many other processes used the mineral and the use of asbestos was not sparse . The Union Carbide mill near King City, CA was the only asbestos production plant for years, barely able to keep up with the high demand for its trademark , Calidria asbestos.
Union Carbide mined its chrysotile asbestos from the Diablo Mountains north of the Central California town of Coalinga after discovering so much asbestos it estimated it could mine for 4,000 years without hitting bottom. The site, a mountain that is 40 to 50 percent asbestos, is still considered the world''s largest supply of asbestos according to a U.S. Geological Survey advisor to the company. Over the many decades, the 450 men and women who worked at the mill, as well as the 11,000 residents of King City were exposed to the asbestos daily.
Union Carbide pumped out $92 million worth of Calidria asbestos over 22 years before selling the plant to an investor group in 1985. In the mid-1980s, asbestos lawsuits were creating legal problems for companies that had produced or used asbestos. Union Carbide has been a unit of Dow Chemical Co. since 2001 and is now facing a flurry of lawsuits over the injuries and deaths blamed on asbestos shipped around the world from King City. Of the thousands of asbestos related lawsuits, not a single King City worker is named as a plaintiff in any case, which Union Carbide has been using as a defense for the company being unjustly blamed.
Over the years, Union Carbide workers said they were reassured of their safety, even as the dangers of asbestos became better known. Now, worried workers have been questioning if the asbestos company failed to fully inform them of the conditions present. An occupational medicine specialist who toured the mill in the mid-1980s described in a deposition of what he saw, noting, “Calidria was everywhere. There was a patina of dust on everything.” Conditions described by former workers at the mill included descriptions of improper regulation that Union Carbide has continued to deny existed.
According to internal documents, Union Carbide may not have been as open with workers about asbestos dangers as they claimed to be. In 1974, Union Carbide handed out a brochure entitled “What Every Worker Should Known About Asbestos” that encouraged workers to quit smoking and promote dust-control efforts, as well as implying workers would be safe inhaling some asbestos so long as it was not too much. This brochure came out after studies had shown the risk of cancer with even low doses of asbestos exposure. When the mill opened, Union Carbide''s corporate medical director sen t a manager a copy of a book on lung disease, including a chapter on asbestosis with an accompanying letter saying, “It is not the sort of book we would want readily available to plant personnel in general.”
The company also failed to disclose details of a study it commissioned three years later comparing the scarring potential of its asbestos with that mined in Canada. After injecting the asbestos into the bellies of rats and guinea pigs, the confidential report concluded Union Carbide''s Calidria produced the most severe reaction. According to a California Environmental Protection Agency official who monitors research on the asbestos produced in the state, scientists involved in occupational and environmental regulatory issues generally believe all forms of asbestos are capable of causing lung cancer, mesothelioma and fibrotic asbestosis.
Since mesothelioma, a fatal cancer linked to asbestos exposure, can take as many as 50 years after a person''s initial asbestos exposure to develop, many Union Carbide workers may not yet be suffering from asbestos related illnesses. The King City mill did not open until 1963, so many Union Carbide workers have been living in fear of what might develop years down the road because of their asbestos exposure. Documents disclosed in lawsuits in Georgia, Texas and Florida indicate Union Carbide doctors saw possible symptoms of asbestos-related diseases in King City workers in about three-dozen cases.
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