"White Asbestos Dust is Safe"

Here at C&D we often hear comments from clients and builders about things that they consider to be perfectly safe and we consider to be hazardous, but a site visit by one of our consultants last week brought comments that we found to be unbelievable.

The consultant was carrying out a regular H&S visit to one of our clients who rents a warehouse building for storage of their stock and the building was due to have a fire inspection, hence the visit.

Our client was not aware that the owner of the building was re-roofing the warehouse so they and our consultant were surprised, when they arrived at site, to find a roofing contractor installing metal roofing sheets on top of the existing asbestos cement sheets by drilling through the asbestos cement sheets to install the fixings.

Upon seeing the work we advised our client to keep out of the building until an analyst had visited and advised the roofer to stop work at once as they were releasing white asbestos dust (chrysotile) during their work and their men did not have masks or overalls in use.

The events that followed were simply unbelievable:-

1. The roofers said they had been told by both their boss and the owner of the building that "White Asbestos Dust is Safe" and no special precautions were needed!
2. When we spoke to the Managing Agents of the building they repeated the comment that "White Asbestos Dust is Safe".
3. The roofers were completely unconcerned that chrysotile debris was falling from each screw hole down onto our clients stock below thus requiring all stock to be cleaned and decontaminated, and that they were exposing themselves to deadly asbestos fibres every time that hey drilled a hole.

When you consider that asbestos related diseases kill over 4,000 people a year in the UK it is unbelievable to me that a Managing Agent does not know that dust kills, does not know their duties under CAR2012 and allows workers to be exposed. And it is equally unbelievable that a roofing contractor has not trained his men in the dangers of asbestos.

We carried out a free asbestos awareness toolbox talk on the spot and hope that the guys understood the dangers and the need to be correctly trained as asbestos training CAT B and are face fitted for masks before they do any more work of this type.

We are returning to site later this week to ensure that things have improved.

If you are considering re-roofing a property that has an asbestos cement roof remember that work on that roof falls under the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 and all relevant precautions need to be in place to prevent the spread of asbestos fibres and all workers must be suitably trained.

Asbestos Awareness and CAT B courses can be booked through C&D and full course details are on our training site at www.demolitiontraining.com