Trades at Risk

The minerals known as asbestos are found in rock ores occurring chiefly in Canada, South Africa, Russia, Australia, and to a lesser extent, other parts of the world. While the asbestos mining and milling industry itself was not present in the New York and New Jersey area, such workers were at great risk for asbestos disease.

Once mined and milled, asbestos fiber was incorporated into many and varied products, insulations, friction, packing and sealing materials, refractories, and others (see Sources of Asbestos Exposure above) through the better part of the twentieth century, until its use was curtailed in the 1970's and 1980's. As a consequence of decades of manufacture, sale, installation and use of various asbestos products, many occupations are at risk of encountering "friable" asbestos products where the products are capable of emitting asbestos dust or fiber into the air workers and bystanders are breathing.

Often, asbestos products are friable when they are being installed, cut, mixed, sprayed, handled, repaired, torn out, or otherwise disturbed in construction, maintenance, and repair. However, some asbestos products can be in such poor or deteriorated condition that drafts or minor vibrations are enough to put toxic levels of asbestos into the air.

Because of these characteristics of asbestos and asbestos products, we have found asbestos exposure and asbestos disease in the following kinds of occupational settings in the New York and New Jersey area. They include specific plants and industries, and construction and building trades where workers were exposed over a career of working for various contractor-employers at many different job sites.

» Industrial Workers
» Plumbers and Heating and Air Conditioning Contractor
» Utility Workers
» Shipyard Workers
» Construction and Building Trades
» Carpenters, Bricklayers, Pipefitters and Electricians
» Refining, Foundries, and Steel Workers
» Maintenance Workers and Non-Union Crafts
» Chemical, Pharmaceutical and Beverage Workers