Document jmzo6wpaGy7YZJEa8KMgZZ56Z

FILE NAME: Fibreboard (FIB) DATE: 1982 Oct 13 DOC#: FIB019 DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION: Legal - Statement of George J. Taylor George J. Taylor Environmental Engineer P.O. Box 185 Cownieviile. CA 95935 (916) 289-3223 f ? 5 r ~ :V ~ P f 3 ^- STATEMENT OF GEORGE J. TAYLOR P . 0. Box #185 t 1 Downieville, California 95936 TO: DATE: William S. Bailey, Seattle, Washington October 13, 1982 ' I give this statement of my own free will. It is true and accurate to the best of my recollection. During the late 1940's, I worked for the Bureau of Adult Health, a division of the California State Department of Public Health,^as an industrial hygiene engineer. We were concerned with advising industry-, the Division of Industrial Safety, and labor organizations about occupational health hazards. The Bureau of Adult Health did engineering studies of places of employment to evaluate health hazards such as dusts, fumes, vapors, gases, noise, and radiation. The Bureau's role was advisory only. If a health hazard existed, we would make recommendations to management on how to correct the problem. If enforcement"was necessary, this function was handled by I undertook this study and intermittently for some months made measurements of air borne dust, air currents in the buildings, and flow in the ventilation system. My primary focus was on Pabco's roofing paper plant which had a significant dust problem. Pabco was coating their roofing paper with tar and then putting slate dust over this. Slate dust can cause silicosis, but as not related to asDestos. They did not apply asbestos to this product. During this time, I also did air sampling around an asbestos shredding machine. I do not remember how the asbestos problem entered into the study. It was not part of the roofing paper operation. A worker was dumping bags of raw African asbestos into a hopper on the shredder. I don't know which mineral type this asbestos was. Visible dust was raised by this operation. There was no exhaust ventilation for the control of the asbestos dust. The worker was equipped with a filter respirator. _ In the summer of 1949, I left the Bureau of Adult Health in Berkeley. To the best of my knowledge the Pabco study was never com pleted and no written report of my work was ever produced. During the course of the study I discussed with Mr. Lambie the on-going findings. T do not remember the levels of dust found. In the late 19 4 0 's it was well understood by industrial ' Lhygienists that asbestos 'dust caused asbestosis which is a type of -i;;~l^)pneumoconiosis. Asbestos particles, which are sometimes several ^ ^ ^ ^ ^^EphsUj=ong^ .-can-_be ^djLsftinguished from other ,,dust. Based on this .. ^iX^y^nowiedge'- ." l -- * 2 ,,-'tf-tl'.v - ^ ' " ...- . ' ` California had a - - - - - ^^'-d^^^the'h'pime.;I inspected the - maximum allowable concentration (MAC), _. - Pabco plant, of five million particles per - tT - " '- ? - ? - '' ' r:; - `1 ' r: - *> : . ' - ' i i . ; We.'knew chat asbestosis was caused by breaching asbescos dust We also suspected that asbestos was implicated as a cause of lung As industrial hygienists our goal was to eliminate Che sources of occupational disease. While workers were some-times provided with respirators in dusty conditions, we never knew how well they fit, or how well they worked, or how conscientiously chey were used. Therefore, we were trying t;o eliminate the source of the dust so that workers would not be dependent on masks. Occupational health problems connected with mining caused an earlier development of industrial hygiene programs in California than in many other states. Silicosis was recognized as a significant occupational disease in the 1930's. Sometime between 1935 and 1940, the Bureau of Adult Health, was formed to investigate and solve these problems.. ' ' ' In 1949 I left the Bureau of Adult Health, and went to Redding as a Sanitary Engineer for the California State Department of Public Health. In 1951 I went to Brazil for four years to advise that government on setting up an industrial hygiene program. - 7