WITTENOOM

Hi, My name's Theresa McLeod.

I'm an M P.

H student at the School of Global Public Health.

This is a presentation for my global environmental health class

in the fall of 2020 which knew the town that

got it wrong, people.

The purpose of this presentation is to show the devastating

effects that can occur at an asbestos mining company when

safety is overlooked.

First, we'll discuss a little bit of background about what

is asbestos and why it's dangerous.

Then we'll go into the mining process, and then we'll

go over the company timeline.

And after that we'll discuss some of the outcomes that

occurred because this company was in operations.

And then we'll go through a summary, and I'll show

you some of the resources that I used for research.

So the S fastest in wit newme was crocodile light.

This is a blue asbestos.

It's a mineral fiber.

It's found in soil and rock in the picture.

In the center, you can compare about about 20,000 asbestos

fibers to a few grains of salt, but asbestos was

known for its strength and making it a desirable construction

material. It was also known to be flame resistant and

used often in insulation.

So one of the managers questioned a doctor that came

to visit the mine in wit.

New here was his quote.

All the fuss is just a bunch of bull dust.

Let's find out more if this is accurate.

So even before the mine broke ground, asbestos was known

to be a carcinogen.

One of the reasons that makes it so dangerous is

because the fibers air small, small, it becomes airborne, and

our respiratory system is one of the are systems that

is exposed to the external environment.

So when we inhale, we inhaled these particles.

So when these particles are inhaled, the fighter cells in

our body cannot completely engulf them, and they induce a

controlled cell death that stimulates inflammation.

Some of the diseases that you'll see associated with asbestos

around the world is shown here in this graph lung

cancer being the most prevalent, although there's also mesothelioma, ovarian

cancer, throat cancer and S best assis in the picture

on the left, under a microscope, the blue is the

infected area, so this graph shows the amount of asbestos

imports that occurred and the amounts of death that occurred

related to asbestos disease.

So here we see that asbestos is dangerous even when

important, and not just in the mining setting.

80% of the people that lived in Witney, um, died

off a specious related diseases.

This is extremely sad because this is a completely preventable

disease. Had exposure not occurred, Thea, other 20% died of

natural causes.

So let's discuss what newme a little bit more whit

Noon is a death trap quoted by President of the

Asbestos Disease Society of Western Australia.

So Whitney um is located north of Perth in western

Australia. It is about a 12 hour drive in the

middle of nowhere to get to Whitney.

Um, it is known to be the largest contaminated site

in the Southern Hemisphere.

So now let's learn about the mining process.

So mining began in shaft.

Often these air small closed corridors, and then it would

be moved to the factory where it was later be

crushed. So the rock starts out looking a little bit

like this, and then we see the employees here, putting

it into the machines to crush further the asbestos.

In some factories, Theus pestis would be dampened, but the

quality of water and the water supply in wit, new

being so far isolated from the rest of the area

that they did not dampen the asbestos in wit newme

as well international standards when exported and didn't really like

when of the asbestos was wet.

So then the asbestos now looks a little bit something

like this.

Yeah, then the asbestos is ready for transportation and gets

put into these Hessen bags because it's best this is

so tiny they would often seep through the material of

thes bags and then further transfer it to the community.

Once transported, it would go to various construction sites, which

we will discuss a little bit later.

The mining company in Witten, um, mind approximately 160,000 tons

of asbestos now.

To put that into perspective, this is approximately the weight

of 6.5 statues of liberty, or about the weight of

12. Brooklyn Bridge is so now.

Where does the asbestos go next?

Many of us have might have heard about taking precautions

when doing renovations on your house to be aware of

when your house was built to know if to not

disturb the asbestos and have a safe removal to not

expose yourself to this dangerous product.

Here is a graph of the most where asbestos was

consumed in each product group, so the biggest group being

cement water pipes.

So these air typically the pipes that are underground.

Here's also cement sheeting, both in residential and commercial and

roofing flooring in friction products.

So that's the mining process.

So now let's go into the company timeline.

So the company broke ground in 1943.

Already there had been known that asbestos was dangerous before

this time, and claims were even made in some countries

against asbestos and their employers.

Also, in 1943 a report on the asbestos mill owned

and operated by the subsidiary of the company that what

the same company that was owned in wit New says

that asbestos dust is a health hazard and discusses methods

of eliminating it.

The company carried on, though first warnings occurred on Lee

a year after it opened, two years after the warnings

were first case of asbestos related disease from a wit,

new employees was determined at this time.

The inspector at the Witte New Mine said the conditions

of dust were terrific.

This was not the case.

The warnings continued in 1948 and on exposure limit was

set for Australia in 1951.

So this limit was 106 76 particles per cubic centimeter.

The mine at Whitney um was often 6 to 8

times over the safe levels, although now we know that

there is no safe level of asbestos, and 10 years

later that limit was reduced by 97% and then later

reduced altogether 20 So in 1965 20 years after the

mine opened, locals were warned by the local council about

the dangers of asbestos in the community.

The plant later closed in 1966 not for safety reasons,

more for financial and economic reasons.

During this time period, Australia had the highest record incidents

of mesothelioma in the world because during this time Australia

was the highest user of asbestos based products.

The local market was dominated by this firm in wit

newme. So now let's go into the outcomes and what

happened after the closure of the mine.

So in 1967 blue asbestos was banned in Australia today,

parts of the world have bans and restrictions on asbestos.

Although there are many countries that don't, as you can

see, the United States is one of them.

So as we saw in the time frame, there were

warnings, although thes warnings, nobody did anything about them.

This because the public Health Department didn't have much authority

of over what minds could do and how fines would

be in place if they didn't meet these restrictions.

So throughout, after the mine closed, thes systems were set

in place and this Festus societies to prevent the diseases

were set up and different public health policies like the

requirement for ventilation and meeting these exposure limits.

So, in 1988 the first victory in court happened amongst

the survivors.

20 million would be paid to the 100 survivors who

worked at Whitney, um, up to 1958 with $30 million

to those who worked there.

After in 2000 and six, the power was turned off

to wit newme altogether, including water supply and other utilities

for the city.

In 2000 and seven, it was removed altogether from the

maps in Australia and designated a contaminated site.

Now it's argued that should wit newbie still be on

Google Earth if it was removed from the maps?

Today, there is one person living in wit, new and

despite being removed from the map, many individuals have taken

to Whitney, um, as a form of extreme tourism.

So what did we learn from wit News story that

maybe we should listen toe warnings.

We should take safety seriously and the proper protection and

equipment needed for a project or a company isn't just

there to create extra costs.

It's there for the protection of the people.

A specious is dangerous, and policy intervention is required for

change to happen.

As we saw, the mine was able to run and

continue operations for so many years, although it would, asbestos

was already known to be dangerous.

Yeah, So although progress is important, it's important that we

don't turn a blind eye to safety.

Yeah, Now, here are some other resources that I used

for my presentation.

There are actually some interesting documentaries on YouTube you can

find. The Safety Institute was one of the ones that

I watched a few times and found very fascinating.

People also kind of say this is like the Chernobyl

of Australia.

I want to thank you again for listening to my

presentation. My name is Charisa McLeod.

And should you wish to ask me any questions?

Follow up or discuss more.

Here are some ways you can find me.

WITTENOOM

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