Mesothelioma at Anaconda Aluminum Co. in Sebree, KY (Podcast)

In this podcast, John Maher and attorney Paul Kelley discuss Anaconda Aluminum Co in Sebree, KY. Many people who worked in and around this facility were exposed to asbestos and may be suffering from mesothelioma or other related diseases as a result. Learning about potential legal rights from this situation is essential.

John Maher: Hi, I am John Maher, and I’m here today with Paul Kelley. Paul is a partner with the Kentucky personal injury law firm, Satterley & Kelley, which has over 45 years of collective experience in litigating mesothelioma and asbestos claims.

Today we’re talking about mesothelioma at Anaconda Aluminum Company in Sebree, Kentucky. Welcome, Paul.

Paul Kelley: Hey, John. How are you doing today?

John: Well, how are you?

Paul: I’m great, thank you.

About Anaconda Aluminum Company and Asbestos

John: So, Paul, tell us a little bit about Anaconda Aluminum Company, what they are, where they’re located.

Paul:  So, Anaconda Aluminum is an aluminum smelting operation that’s located in Sebree, Kentucky West or Central Kentucky. And it was built approximately in 1972, 1973. It’s changed hands a few times over the years. A lot of these aluminum companies are bought up by other companies, but the timeframe that we were most interested in it, it was Anaconda Aluminum and it made aluminum products and it was a smelting operation. And so what they did as a smelting operation is they took raw ore and they basically heated it and it produced a steel or aluminum product. And then that product was actually sent somewhere else to make another piece. And then that was sent somewhere else into the final customer for whatever it is that they did with it.

There are a lot of smelting and rolling mill operations in that area of Kentucky, and Anaconda Aluminum was one of them. And it still operates today under a different name. I think a company called Century Aluminum operates that facility in Sebree now, and it’s provided a product continuously for over 50 years now.

John: Okay. And so how was Anaconda Aluminum related to asbestos and mesothelioma cancer claims?

Paul: Well, so this again is one of those time periods where the plant was built right at the time that the Occupational Safety and Health Act was enacted. And before that time, virtually every industrial plant in the United States was constructed with asbestos. And even though this plant kind of came up right at the time that OSHA was enacted and became into operation, it was constructed with asbestos. And we know that because we have had the opportunity to help some people that worked there during the construction phase, during operations, and then that wide variety of stuff. And so they had thermal insulation was located all throughout the facility.

The plant had lots of steam piping located throughout the plant. These steam pipes carried steam that was hundreds of degrees in temperature Fahrenheit, and they were wrapped with asbestos. Lots of the piping contained chemicals that were very hot and they were wrapped with asbestos. The steel at that facility or the aluminum at that facility, they were made in something called pots. There were pot lines in the plant. And so the pot lines were just these long rows of pots. And the pots were significant size and diameter, several feet probably in diameter and several feet high. And they were where liquid was poured in to essentially make the ingot and the pots were insulated with asbestos. And there were lots of them, hundreds of pots that were in the plant. And they contain refractory material, they contain insulation, and all of those materials were contained asbestos at one point in time.

The pipes were frequently connected together, the pipes were connected to the gaskets. Gaskets contained asbestos during that period of time. There were valves all throughout the plant. The valves all were packed with asbestos packing. There were pumps that were all throughout the plant. The pumps were also stuffed with asbestos packing. There was just a wide variety of insulating products that were located throughout the plant. And probably some of those products are still there today. But certainly, when the plant was in operation in the seventies and eighties, it was all over the place and there were lots of people in various capacities that were exposed to it for many, many years.

What Types of Employees at Anaconda Aluminum May have Been Exposed to Asbestos?

John: So, who were some of the types of employees that might’ve been exposed to asbestos when working here at Anaconda Aluminum?

Paul: Sure. So of course, there are people that constructed the plant and there was a lot of different crafts that participated in building that plant. There were millwrights and the millwrights put in a lot of the equipment conveyors. They put the pot lines in. There was insulators, insulators insulated the pipes and the pot lines and other equipment in the plant. There were pipe fitters and the pipe fitters installed all the piping and they put the gaskets in. Lots of times, the pipe fitters and the millwrights both installed the gaskets and the valves, and the pumps. With the asbestos packing, there were electricians that worked in the plant. There were engineers that worked in the plant that all participated in the construction phase of it.

Then the plant came into operation and you had all the people that operated the equipment. You had maintenance staff plant of this size, and it was a many-acres facility plant that size. It’s going to have a lot of maintenance people that are participating in the day-to-day affairs of keeping the plant running. It was an aluminum smelting operation. They couldn’t afford to have large periods of inactivity. And so they made sure that they kept it running and lots of times maintenance staff would have to fix equipment and tear insulation off in order to do that or pull pipes apart to contain gaskets and have to scrape those gaskets off frequently. They would’ve overhauls of the equipment that was in the plant. So like the pot lines, for example, they had to be relined every now and again, or the pots that were in the lines had to be relined. And so somebody would come in and they’d tear all that insulation out. That was typically the mill rights. Sometimes it was insulators. And those kinds of people would be exposed when they did that.

Eventually, they might have had some people that come in to remove those things permanently. And even though they supposedly used the latest, greatest, safest, best methods, there’s still a potential for exposure for people to perform those types of activities. I mean, even people like the plant superintendent or the general foreman, the engineers, the people who worked in an office somewhere, if they walk through the plant, they were exposed.

If they spent time out there supervising their staff, they were exposed. People who delivered products to the plant when it was an operation, the custodians of the facility, people that might’ve worked in the offices cleaning, but they had to go through the plant, visitors to the plant for whatever reason. I’m not necessarily saying this happened at Anaconda, but I’ve heard numerous places that they would have parties for families right there in the plant at various points in time and people would be exposed to whatever was in the plant because once asbestos is there, it’s always there. And it can be disturbed in numerous ways if it’s not…

How Does Someone Get Exposed to Asbestos?

John: It might be in the air, or it might be on a surface, and then somebody touches that surface and it gets in the air and you can breathe it in.

Paul: Absolutely. I mean, if it’s on the floor and people are shuffling their feet, it gets disturbed. If there’s a window open and a breeze comes through, it can get disturbed. It takes highly specialized equipment to remove asbestos. And most companies didn’t do that until much, much later when they needed to get it out because of more stringent regulations and that sort of thing.

So there were a lot of people and a lot of different crafts who were regularly exposed. And then there was a lot of people who spent a little bit less time or maybe didn’t do things directly hands-on, and they were exposed too. We’ve heard Dr. Selikoff is one of the most famous scientists, physicians, researchers of mesothelioma. He kind of blew the door open on exposing the health risks associated with asbestos. And then this disease process, mesothelioma, and Dr. Selikoff is famous for saying, “Asbestos doesn’t care what job you had. Asbestos doesn’t care who you are, what your education is. All asbestos cares about is do you have lungs and did it get into your lungs?”

And if that’s what happened, then you were at substantial risk for contracting disease. Some people at a higher risk than others. But certainly, if you worked in that plant, you had a heck of a lot higher risk of contracting mesothelioma than people who worked in office like I do and don’t go to places like that. It was a tough place and it was a place where people had a lot of exposure and a lot of people had exposure over the years.

Were Office Employees Exposed to Asbestos?

John: But even if you worked in the office, say at Anaconda Aluminum, like you said, the likelihood that you would never go into the manufacturing plant and get exposure there is unlikely. They had parties there, company parties and things like that. And then, of course, you’re coming into contact with other people who probably do work down on the manufacturing floor. So there’s just no getting away from it.

Paul: Absolutely. I mean, if you worked in the office and you never went into the plant, you weren’t doing your job. And I doubt that that was a realistic scenario. And in fact, I know it’s not realistic because I’ve talked to a lot of people that had those kinds of jobs and they were exposed. It was a pervasive exposure, and it was one that you couldn’t avoid unless you were fortunate enough not to set foot in the plant. But even then, we’ve seen family members of plant workers who were diagnosed with mesothelioma, and their only known exposure was to their loved one’s clothing.

A lot of people, let’s just use as an example, the insulators that came and insulated those pots, they didn’t know. And so they got asbestos all over their clothes. They did the very best they could to blow them off of the air compressor at the end of the shift, but they didn’t know any better. So they got in their cars, they drove home, asbestos fell all throughout their car. They get to their house, they hug their kids, they sit on their couch, they shuffle in through their carpeting and unbeknownst to them, they’ve exposed the whole family to asbestos.

And they do that every day, day in and day out.

John: Sure.

Paul: And so even people who didn’t work in the plant were exposed. And to the extent that there are still people out there that are alive that were exposed in that way, I will predict that there’ll be a handful of them that will develop mesothelioma.

What Should You Do if You are Diagnosed with Mesothelioma?

John: Right. So if you have mesothelioma now, and you worked in the Anaconda Aluminum Company plant, what should you do next?

Paul: I think it’s important to determine what your legal rights are. What I think most people do when they are diagnosed with this disease is they start to research it. And you’ll probably find things from me and other lawyers and you’ll find things from medical providers. And so you’ve got a lot of decisions you have to make. One, of course, is determine what the best medical plan is for you and your family. And there’s so many different options, and you can discuss that with your team of doctors that most likely you have. But you also have to determine whether or not you have a lawsuit. And so this particular facility, the Anaconda facility, I mean, I can tell you that you’ve got a potential claim that you can pursue against a number of entities and potentially even Anaconda depending on who you are.

But unfortunately, time doesn’t stand still for you. And while you have this really important medical issues that you have to determine, you also need to figure out your legal plan as well. It’s important to hire attorneys that you’re comfortable with. It’s important that you hire that have experience with asbestos and mesothelioma cases. And I think it’s really important that you hire attorneys that have experience with the particular location that you worked.

The difference between getting your case filed in a month or two versus six or eight months could have devastating consequences. Most people, unfortunately, are going to die from this disease, mesothelioma within six to 18 months of getting the diagnosis. And some may live for a bit. They get really sick. And the best evidence I’m ever going to have, what your exposure was, how you were exposed, how long you worked there, and all the things that we have to navigate through in order to be successful, it’s going to come from you.

And so it’s important that a case gets filed while you still have the ability to participate. And the sincere hope is that you live for five years beyond diagnosis. You live for years beyond the lawsuit. But unfortunately, the stark reality is that things may not work out the way you want from a health standpoint. And in order to help you in the short run, your family in the long run, I think it’s important to go ahead and get things going.

Memories fade, evidence is lost. There’s just a variety of negative consequences that occur from delay. And by the way, when a case is filed, our adversaries have every incentive to slow things down, to stop progress. And so the last thing we want to do is give them an assist and impede our own progress. So it’s important while you’re assessing and evaluating and determining your medical plan, it’s also important for you to assess and evaluate and determine your legal plan.

What is the Statute of Limitations in Kentucky for Asbestos Cases?

John: So, is there a statute of limitations in Kentucky for filing a claim against Anaconda Aluminum, and how does that play a role in a mesothelioma claim like this?

Paul: Absolutely. In Kentucky, we have one year from the day that you know or should know that you have an injury and no one should know the cause of your injury. So it’s not necessarily the date of diagnosis. However, we always file within a year of diagnosis just to make sure there’s no problems. But more importantly, we want to get that lawsuit filed as quickly as possible. As I alluded to a moment ago, there’s just a wide variety of reasons why six months or eight months or 10 months down the road, evidence may be lost, your ability to participate, so we don’t want to do anything or either to increase the risk that you won’t be able to participate in your case.

But that having been said, there’s all kinds of different reasons as to why cases get close to the statute. It’s really important to get it filed within that year. Even if a judge would like for you to be able to pursue your case, if the judge believes that you filed it late, they don’t have much discretion. And so it’s important to get the case filed.

Because it’s important to get the case filed, it’s important to talk to lawyers early. It’s important to give the lawyers the opportunity to investigate so that we don’t run the risk ourselves of getting close and still not really knowing everything. This particular location that we’re talking about today, I know a lot about, but there could be other locations that you’ve worked at that we still have to conduct some investigation, figure out, talk to witnesses, try to find documents and that sort of thing.

So, the later we’re able to get started, the longer it takes to get the case filed, the longer it takes to get the case filed, the longer it takes to start receiving compensation from the parties that have caused your cancer. And then we, of course, know how much you need it for yourself, and we also know how much your family needs that financial assistance. So, delay, waiting, it’s almost never a good thing.

John: All right. Well, that’s really great information, Paul. Thanks again for speaking with me today.

Paul: Thank you, John. I appreciate it.

Get More Information About Mesothelioma and Asbestos Exposure

John: And for more information about mesothelioma and asbestos exposure, visit the law firm of Satterley & Kelley at satterleylaw.com or call 855-385-9532.