In this episode, John Maher interviews Paul Kelley about the Olin Mathieson facility in Brandenburg, Kentucky, where asbestos was reportedly present throughout the plant. They discuss the types of work that may have led to exposure and the legal steps mesothelioma patients should consider as soon as possible.

John Maher: Hi, I’m John Maher. I’m here today with Paul Kelley. Paul is a partner with the Kentucky personal injury law firm Satterley and Kelley, which has over 45 years of collective experience litigating mesothelioma and asbestos claims. Today, we’re talking about asbestos and mesothelioma at Olin Mathieson in Brandenburg, Kentucky. Welcome, Paul.

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

Olin-Mathieson Plant History in Brandenburg

John: I’m doing well, thanks. Paul, tell us a little bit about Olin Mathieson and what it is that they do.

Paul: So, Olin Mathieson is a chemical company. It was formed in the early 1950s. It was a combination of a company called Olin Industries and Mathieson Chemical. It, I think, still operates. The company, Olin Mathieson, I think is still open. The particular plant that we’ll be talking about today was in an area called Brandenburg, Kentucky. It’s south of where I’m at in Louisville. And it specialized in turning natural gas into, or processed natural gas into, several organic chemicals. I think propylene or propylene oxide, ethylene oxide. So a lot of chemical processes. The plant at issue, I think, was open around 1954, in the early 1950s. And the plant, the physical structure, still exists today, but it’s operated by a different company called Monument Chemical, which purchased the plant in 2013. The period of time that we’re going to be most focused on today is going to be in the 50s through the 1980s and 1990s, and that’s when Olin Mathieson was the owner and operator of the facility.

Where Asbestos Was Present at the Olin Mathieson Facility

John: And so how was Olin Mathieson and their facility related to asbestos and mesothelioma cases?

Paul: So this particular facility, to my knowledge, asbestos was not utilized in the production process, at least not as a component of anything they made or specifically used. But this is an old facility. It’s a very significant plant that has a production area. It has offices. It has a power plant. And given the timeframe that it was built, in the 1950s, it contained asbestos and it was, quite frankly, loaded with asbestos and all kinds of different asbestos products from pipe insulation, insulating materials on your boilers from the thermal insulation to fire brick, refractory material, gaskets. There was insulation that was associated with some of the equipment that was used in the plant, typically thermal insulation.

There are valves, tons of valves. You’ve got chemicals flowing through pipes all throughout the plant. Valves frequently had what we call valve packing. It was like a gasketing material that contained asbestos. We had insulating cement that was used in the plant that was frequently on walls and covering equipment. There was something called Transite that was likely used in the facility. Transite was something that frequently was a corrugated cement material that frequently walls were made of. So there was a great deal of asbestos at that plant and it would have, probably in 2013, if somebody went into that building today, you’d probably still find asbestos in there.

How Workers May Have Been Exposed to Asbestos

John: And so when and how were the employees and people that worked at Olin Mathieson exposed to this asbestos that was in the facility?

Paul: So I would say that the main way that people were exposed would certainly be your maintenance kind of workers. A plant like that, I mean, it had to stay in operation, and it was a massive size, and things went wrong frequently. And so they would have maintenance employees that would do certain things. And we recently worked on a case for a gentleman that was involved in maintenance. And if they had a small problem with a pipe, they didn’t hire an outside contractor to come in, they had their maintenance staff, and that piping was frequently insulated with asbestos.

So the maintenance employee would tear the asbestos off, repair the pipe, replace the pipe. And sometimes, depending on the timeframe, it might have been reinsulated with asbestos or it could have been reinsulated with something else. So we certainly see a lot of maintenance people, and that would be true with the gaskets and the valves, and perhaps even the boilers.

But frequently, when significant projects had to occur, they hired outside contractors. They would hire boilermakers to perform boiler work. They would hire pipe fitters to perform major pipe projects. They would perform sheet metal workers to perform duct work and other kind of sheet metal work. Mill rights who frequently worked on all kinds of different types of equipment, tanks, things that were located throughout the plant. And so all those workers would frequently have to be involved in asbestos in some way.

If you’re a pipe fitter, frequently, just like the maintenance employees, you’re tearing asbestos insulation off of pipes. If you’re a boiler maker, lots of times they came into the plant every two or three years and they rebuilt those boilers, not the physical steel, but the things that went inside the boilers, which would be the insulation and the fire brick and the refractory and gaskets and those people would be exposed.

Lots of times your skilled laborers would have to replace valves or replace the packing in the valves and the packings would contain the asbestos. Sometimes they would have major renovation projects where they’re adding onto the plant that would require tear-out of materials and they’re tearing all of these things out.

But there were even people who just worked in the plant, that did things that had nothing to do with disturbing or working with any of the asbestos materials directly. They were involved in production, they were office workers, they were supervisors, they were warehouse employees, and they were exposed. Well, how could folks like that be exposed? It’s an old plant, and the asbestos, particularly the thermal insulation, the pipe insulation, it was located…there’d be miles of pipe in this plant. And it would carry steam, it would carry chemicals that were hot, carry gas, and a lot of these things were insulated. And over the years, those things deteriorate and the insulation deteriorates and it would fall on people, it would fall on machines, it would fall on the floor and asbestos gets in the air that way. People are trying to clean areas and they use compressed air and they blow that stuff all over the place.

Once asbestos gets into a space it’s there forever, or at least there for many, many years, unless the company hired specialty companies to come in and perform a thorough industrial hygiene cleaning of the facility. And I’ve been doing this a long time and I’ve never seen that happen. I mean, maybe in the 2000s and closer to the time that we’re in now, maybe they hired companies to come in and do a real…not just take the asbestos off the pipes and the boilers and the equipment, but to actually do a thorough cleaning of the plant.

I never saw that done back in the 70s, 80s, and even into the 90s. So even what seems to be innocuous, fleeting, intermittent types of exposures turn into something bigger when the asbestos is just in the plant and it’s being moved around all day, every day. And then maybe not every day, but frequently new asbestos is introduced in the air in some way, whether it’s the result of a maintenance project or a contractor performing a project or the deterioration situation where it fell from 50, 100 feet up in the air and hit the ground and proliferated all over the place.

So your maintenance employees, your contractors and specialty workers that were specifically to have direct involvement, those were certainly the people that had the most significant exposures in a place like Olin, but I believe that people that worked there for 20, 30 years, they were frequently exposed from asbestos just being in the plant and being disturbed in some way, on some basis, and then it’s in their environment. And just through natural conditions, the asbestos gets swirled around and gets on some people’s clothes, in their breathing zone.

And what we have learned, what medical and scientific literature has told us is that it does not take a great deal of asbestos exposure to cause mesothelioma. There are reports that one day of exposure has been sufficient to cause people to develop cancer. So it’s certainly not unusual or unlikely that someone that worked in a facility that contained asbestos for 30 years gets diagnosed in their 60s or 70s, despite the fact that they had no personal interaction or involvement with any of the asbestos containing materials that were in the plant.

What Mesothelioma Patients Should Do Next

John: And so if you were an employee of Olin Mathieson and you worked at that facility, or maybe you were a contractor who was hired to come in and do some of these maintenance types of jobs, and now you have mesothelioma, what should you do? What are your next steps?

Paul: So mesothelioma is a terminal cancer. There is no known cure. From our standpoint, of course, our job is to try to help you and your family obtain compensation and justice for this cancer that is completely, entirely preventable. The biggest problem that families are facing when someone is diagnosed with cancer is the shock of being diagnosed with something terminal, which…the impact’s no less whether somebody’s 40 or whether somebody’s 80, but to deal with the emotional impact of that, to deal with how you’re going to attack the cancer. There’s a lot of different treatments that are available and you and your family would discuss that with your medical team and determine what’s the best system for you to deal with it.

But, unfortunately, time doesn’t stop for you to pursue your legal rights. And in Kentucky, we don’t have very much time. We only have a year from the date that you know or should know you have an injury and know or should know the cause of your injury. Typically, I tell folks, you need to pursue something within a year of being diagnosed, and that’s not very much time.

And we want to be able…as lawyers who represent people like this, we have a lot of goals. And goal number one is to investigate and get the case filed as quickly as possible, identify as many parties as we think that are responsible. Someone who worked at Olin Mathieson for their entire life, that may be the only way that they were exposed, the only place they were ever exposed at. But for contractors that were exposed there, they may have been exposed at a lot of different places. And so we want to be able to investigate that and identify all the ways that you could have been exposed to asbestos. Once the case is filed, then we have a singular mission, and that’s getting your deposition in.

We do the deposition as early as possible so that, if something happens to you before the case gets to trial, we’ll have your deposition on video and you can testify and tell your story, which is so important. Not only are you the best source of information of your exposure, but you’re the best source of information concerning how this cancer has impacted you.

So we’re hoping…and this frequently happens, where our clients are able to come to trial and testify at trial, but if not, we want to be able to get that deposition in so that we can have that proof and be able to provide the information to the jury. But a lot of our clients also find that process, while a little unnerving, to be somewhat therapeutic, because it gives them the opportunity to really say how this cancer impacts them. So our advice to everybody is you need to certainly investigate and undergo the medical care that you feel comfortable with.

And that could be chemotherapy, immunotherapy, surgeries, radiation. It may be doing nothing under the circumstances, and that’s really important. And obviously that’s something for you and your family and your medical team, but you should pursue your legal rights and potential compensation benefits. Again, this cancer is devastating and the outcome is rarely good and medical expenses can go through the roof and people who are working have to stop working and their family members sometimes have to stop working to help care for [them], to take [them] to medical care.

So obtaining compensation is important. And in order to do that, you should move quickly, you should investigate and utilize all the resources that are out there now. 30 years ago, we didn’t have the robust internet that we have today. We didn’t have a lot of the information that’s available today. And you can find information, like what we’re doing today on this podcast, but identify lawyers who have experience doing this work, have experience in the area in which you think your case would likely be pursued, and of course, people that you feel comfortable with.

These cases…I would like to tell you that it’d be over in six months, but that’s not realistic. It could be two years, it could be three years, it could be five years, and you’re going to be in constant communication with your lawyer. And so you want somebody that, when you see their number on the phone, you’re not rolling their eyes and, gosh, you’ve got to talk to this person. Most of my clients, I consider them my very best friends for many years, and we have enduring relationships with them and their families for years to come after their case is completed.

And that’s ultimately what you want. And so I recommend to everybody to hit the ground running, attack the cancer with energy and vigor and enthusiasm and optimism, and attack your case the same way. And while no one on this planet can guarantee you terrific results, you at least give yourself the best chance you possibly can, both from a health standpoint and from a legal standpoint, and that’s what we’re here for.

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

Paul: Thanks, John.

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.

John Maher talks with Paul Kelley about the IBM facility in Lexington, Kentucky, including how asbestos may have been present in the building and possibly in certain manufacturing processes. They also explain how workers may have been exposed and why anyone diagnosed with mesothelioma should act quickly.

John Maher: Hi, I’m John Maher. 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 asbestos exposure at IBM in Lexington, Kentucky. Welcome, Paul.

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

IBM Facility History in Lexington, Kentucky

John: I’m doing well, thanks. Paul, tell us a little bit about IBM and their facility in Lexington, Kentucky, and when they operated.

Paul: Sure, so, I’m confident that everybody’s probably pretty familiar with IBM, particularly with what IBM does today. But of course, its flagship product for many years was typewriters. And so the plant in Lexington…so for those from that area, it was located on New Circle Road. It was opened in 1956 and was a massive facility. Predominantly one building, but there are a couple other smaller buildings, but the facility, I can’t even tell you how many hundreds of thousands of square feet it was.

And for many years, when it opened in 1956 through the 1990s, it manufactured typewriters. It manufactured probably the most famous typewriter for offices called the Selectric typewriter. And my dad, just as a little tidbit, my dad was an attorney as well. And I remember as a kid going into his office and when the new typewriters came in and they had these little word processor components, those were the Selectric typewriters.

And, later on, they made some other things like keyboards and some other computer components. And then later on in 1991, IBM conducted a series of complicated corporate transactions and essentially spun off to a company called Lexmark. And now that same plant has been owned and operated by Lexmark since 1991, and it’s expanded into the numerous computer and printer related products. It’s my understanding that at one point, the IBM plant in Lexington had 6,000 employees, which made it probably the most significant employer in Lexington and one of the most significant employers all throughout the state of Kentucky. It was a big facility and had a lot of people coming through the plant, and it’s been around for 70 years now.

Where Was Asbestos Located at IBM?

John: All right. So talk a little bit about IBM and how they’re related to asbestos and mesothelioma cases.

Paul: Sure. So I think IBM probably had asbestos in two different ways. It certainly was a plant built in 1956. Plants built in 1956, certainly anything before the early 70s, were going to be loaded with asbestos. And what we’ve discovered over the course of the years is this plant was no different. It had asbestos insulation throughout the facility on piping, duct work. It had gaskets. It had electrical components, wires, and cable. It had fireproofing that was throughout the facility. Sometimes this would be in the form of spray-on fireproofing.

It had floor tile, ceiling tiles, roofing materials that contained asbestos. Sometimes there were walls that were located in the facility that had something called Transite. Transite was an asbestos material and people could be exposed to those materials in various ways. So a lot of construction materials were located there, and those materials were used just so the plant could generally function.

We also have pretty solid evidence, and I will put the caveat that this isn’t 100% confirmed, but we believe that some of the products there were made with asbestos. And I’ve discovered some information that there was a molding operation there, and we’ve talked about molding on some prior podcasts, but frequently phenolic molding compounds contained asbestos.

Well, the Selectric typewriter was made with predominantly plastic. It’s a plastic material. And we’ve had descriptions of people who utilized molding compounds to mold products in the facility. And I believe that the Selectric typewriter was likely made with asbestos containing components and likely made with asbestos containing components at that plant.

And certainly what those components would be would range from the casing, and also what made this electric typewriter unique is it had the little plastic ball. If you’ve ever seen a typewriter, the key strikes this ball that’s in the center and the ball keeps going from left to right, depending on what you’re doing. And that ball was made of plastic, and we believe that that ball may have been made with asbestos containing component parts. So people who worked in production, we believe, had an opportunity for exposure to asbestos, and then certainly all of the asbestos building and construction materials that were in the plant.

How Workers May Have Been Exposed to Asbestos at IBM

John: And so how and when were employees potentially exposed to asbestos at the plant?

Paul: So, certainly, anybody that was involved in that molding process would be exposed. Anyone who was nearby the molding process would be exposed. When I say nearby, I mean within a few thousand yards, typically that dust proliferates throughout the plant. So that would be certainly a way that anybody could be exposed.

But certainly anybody involved in maintenance, anybody involved in construction, renovations in the facility, anybody that potentially was present when materials were removed, disturbed in any way. So a couple of my most recent cases were for people who were HVAC workers. And there was a point in time in the ’70s where they came into the plant and they ripped out all of the duct work, and the prior duct work was insulated, and we believe that the insulation contained asbestos. All of that duct work is in places where there are other asbestos containing components.

Pipe insulation was a very common asbestos product. It was in virtually every industrial building built prior to 1972. And so when a HVAC worker or an electrician or a pipe fitter or an insulator, when they’re in the area, what we call above the ceilings — everybody I think is probably familiar with the drop ceiling — and so that’s where they hide all the stuff. And so the pipe insulation, the duct insulation, frequently the electrical components, but even if the electrical components didn’t, the electricians are working right in the same space where asbestos is located.

You hear about just general laborers that came in and had to take out the floor tile that was in the plant. And everybody’s seen that kind of floor tile. I mean, it’s all over buildings today, it’s just not asbestos anymore. And that stuff…just pop it up, scrape it up and break it up and that can release significant levels of asbestos. Certainly ceiling tiles, perhaps not as easy to be exposed because usually those just pop out, but sometimes those tiles would get cut, whether it was by maintenance people or contractors that came in to work in the facility.

Now, obviously back in the day, in the 1950s, when the plant was built, the insulators who insulated the piping and the machinery, duct work, those people would have definitely been exposed. Anyone who was present during that process would have been exposed and renovations occurred all the time.

I mean, that was something that I dealt with, with one of my previous clients, and anytime renovation occurs there is a substantial likelihood that a lot of these asbestos containing materials would be disturbed. And that’s the problem. When asbestos is disturbed, that’s how people are exposed. When a piece of pipe insulation is torn off, it proliferates dust throughout the air. You can’t see all that dust. You can see some of it. You can’t see all the dust.

If you are seeing dust from a product that contains asbestos, you know that you are experiencing a significant and deadly exposure to asbestos, but a huge problem is the dust that you don’t see, the dust that you can’t see. And a lot of that dust was located in a facility like that just by virtue of the asbestos being there and deteriorating, or a random one-off maintenance project where they tore a piece of asbestos insulation off of a pipe, or off of a piece of duct work, or off of a piece of equipment.

The biggest problem with asbestos that I think is just unknown to a lot of people is, once it’s in a space, it’s there for a long, long time. You can’t clean asbestos with a normal household vacuum cleaner. You can’t clean asbestos with a shop vac. Once it gets on the floor, once it gets on a piece of equipment, it’s in a plant and there’s a concept called re-entrainment.

And when asbestos gets on the floor or gets on somebody’s clothing, gets on a piece of equipment, if there’s any activity at all that causes a re-entrainment of the product…and people know what we’re talking about. Is there anything more frustrating than when you’re sweeping the floor in your own house and you’re trying to get it into the little dust pan and it doesn’t all come up, and one of the kids comes by and stirs some up, or a pet or something. Well, it’s the same concept, except it’s not environmental dust, it’s asbestos dust.

So virtually anybody who spent any time in the facility, particularly before the 1990s, would have likely experienced some level of exposure. Now, the people that would experience a higher exposure would be people that were involved either in the molding process or people that have somehow had to have direct interaction with the pipe insulation, duct insulation, gaskets, the Transite, the floor tile, the ceiling tile, and that’s usually going to be either maintenance workers or contractors that have specific specialties in working with those materials. But of course, the problem is that those crafts in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and even 80s, they didn’t know what they were dealing with. They knew how to do the work, but they didn’t know that they were dealing with asbestos.

And that’s quite frankly why we’ve had this huge epidemic of blue collar workers in this country being exposed to asbestos materials because it was all over the place, and places like IBM, and IBM knew it, and the folks who were responsible for designing the building knew it, and maybe the big construction companies that built the plant knew it, but the poor men and women who worked in the plants, they didn’t know it.

Were Companies Required to Remove Asbestos?

John: And has there never been a time when companies like IBM were required to remove any of the asbestos that is in their plants?

Paul: Never required to remove, at least not wholesale. There have been some requirements that if you’re doing a major renovation, demolition, construction, tear out, that they make sure that they know where the asbestos is and that they inform people who may be exposed that it’s there, but there’s never really been a requirement to remove it. Since the early 1970s, thermal insulation is not a thing anymore, but even in 1989, EPA tried to just ban asbestos, the use of asbestos, outright in the United States, and it was defeated because industry strongly opposed it.

And there was a push more recently to ban asbestos, but for political reasons that we don’t want to discuss today, those policies may or may not come through over the next few years, but there has never been a requirement that they absolutely wholesale have to remove asbestos. They do have to protect people and to not overexpose people to asbestos.

Paul: And that’s existed in Kentucky that requirements existed since at least 1956, which happens to coincide with the year that this plant opened. But to be perfectly frank and blunt, the biggest problem that I’ve seen over the years is industry not honoring and respecting and following, implementing the regulations that would have precluded a lot of people from being diagnosed with the cancer that we continue to see people with today.

What to Do After Mesothelioma Exposure at IBM or Lexmark

John: So what should you do now if you did work at the IBM or Lexmark facility and now you have mesothelioma?

Paul: Move quickly on a lot of things. Mesothelioma in particular is a devastating diagnosis. It is a terminal cancer. There is no known cure. There are a lot of treatments for it that can prolong people’s lives and certainly improve the quality of life, but there is no cure for it. And there’s a lot of different possibilities for treatment that people can do depending on when they were diagnosed, what their general physical condition was, their age, and that sort of thing.

So you’ve got a lot to deal with, or a lot of decisions to make, with you and your family and your medical team as to how you will treat the cancer. But where I come in and what I do, the legal part of it, is we don’t have a lot of time and we only…in Kentucky, we only have a year from the date that we know we have a disease and we know or should know what the cause of that disease is, to pursue legal action.

One year seems like a reasonable period of time, but it moves pretty quickly, particularly when you have people who may have been exposed, not just at IBM, but at a whole lot of different places and in a lot of different ways, and you have to be able to figure it out. Because the prognosis for people with mesothelioma is not very good.

6 to 18 months is kind of what medical and scientific literature indicates at this point in time. We want you to be able to participate in your case, you want to be able to participate in your case, your testimony concerning where, when, how you were exposed, what information that you were provided, the best information of that’s going to come from you.

We can certainly get some of that from coworkers and family, but you’re the best source of information concerning your exposure and, bar none, you are the best source of information concerning how this disease impacts you, what your concerns are, what your fears are, what difficulties you have as a result of this cancer, what pain you experience, the treatment you’re receiving and how that treatment impacts you.

And so we want people to be able to tell their stories and let judge, jury, defendants, anybody, experts, understand how you were exposed and how this cancer impacts you. And because you don’t have a lot of time to pursue your legal rights, and because, from a health standpoint, there may come a situation, a point, where you can’t tell your story, you need to move quickly.

And we frequently are hired on a Monday, and later that day we are collecting records, we are searching our database for information because we know a lot about locations like IBM and other places that people may have been exposed, and we are conducting our investigation as soon as possible, and we’re going to get that lawsuit filed as soon as possible. And the quicker that lawsuit gets filed, then our one and only focus turns to getting your deposition in and then getting your case to trial.

I mean, ideally, you’ll be able to be present at trial and you won’t be just looking at a video camera telling your story. You’ll be looking the jury in the eye and telling the jury how you were exposed and how this impacts you. So I hate to tell people that you just can’t sit on your hands and try to figure out exactly how you’re going to treat your cancer, because by the time you get done with some of the treatments, six, seven, eight months down the road may have passed. And while I’m confident that I can still get your case filed, it’s just not going to increase the likelihood that you’ll be able to participate in the case. And that’s what we want, that’s what you want. And quite frankly, that’s what I think justice requires – your participation. And the jury wants to hear from the victim and not other people.

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

Paul: Thank you, John. I appreciate it.

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.

In this episode, John Maher speaks with Paul Kelley about the history of the Air Products facility in Calvert City, Kentucky, how asbestos was present throughout the plant, and how workers and contractors may have been exposed over time. They also discuss what mesothelioma patients should do quickly to protect their legal rights.

John Maher: Hi, I’m John Maher and I’m here today with Paul Kelley. Paul is a partner with the Kentucky Personal Injury Law Firm, Satterley and Kelley, which has over 45 years of collective experience in litigating mesothelioma and asbestos claims. Today we’re talking about asbestos exposure at Air Products & Chemicals in Calvert City, Kentucky. Welcome, Paul.

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

Air Products Facility History and Operations

John: Doing well, thanks. Paul, tell us a little bit about Air Products & Chemicals and their background.

Paul: Sure. Air Products & Chemicals, it’s of course a chemical plant in Calvert City, Kentucky. It started…the physical building was opened in 1961. It was originally owned by a company called Airco, but in about 1971, Air Products took over the facility, operated it for almost 40 years. And now I think it’s owned by a company called Wacker Chemie, which is a German company. They historically have manufactured a chemical called vinyl acetate ethylene. It’s not particularly important for our purposes as to what that chemical is and what it did, but it was something that’s been produced in that plant for many, many years. And I think the people in Calvert City, Kentucky, which is in the western part of the state of Kentucky, are very familiar with that facility.

How Asbestos Was Present at the Air Products Plant

John: Okay. And how was Air Products & Chemicals related to asbestos and mesothelioma cases?

Paul: So, as far as I know, from litigating out of that plant for many years, Air Products did not utilize asbestos as a part of the manufacturing process, per se, but the plant was absolutely loaded with asbestos. It was built during the period of time that you would expect there to be a considerable amount of asbestos products, from thermal insulation to gaskets to electrical wire and cable, boilers, other pieces of equipment like furnaces, ovens.

All of the chemicals that were being produced in the plant, a lot of those were hot processes that ran through piping that had to be insulated with asbestos or some form of insulation. They used asbestos. The piping contained gaskets that were asbestos containing. The boilers had asbestos all over them from an insulation standpoint. So there was a great deal of asbestos that was there, that was necessary for the operation of the plant, but not necessarily used to produce any of the chemicals other than to carry the chemicals through the piping, if that makes sense.

How Workers and Contractors May Have Been Exposed

John: Okay. And so if that’s the case and the asbestos wasn’t necessarily in the chemicals themselves, how and when were employees exposed to the asbestos in the plant?

Paul: So for many years, I think probably employees and contractors and anybody that came into the plant for any period of time were likely exposed fairly significantly. A plant of this size — and it was many football fields long, multiple buildings — there was a lot of maintenance and renovation activities that occurred from 1961 through the ’90s and into the 2000s.

And so, just imagine that you would have maintenance employees that would have to perform various tasks with respect to the piping that was in the plant. And they would come into contact with the asbestos insulation that was on the pipes. They would hire outside contractors that would come in and perform work on the piping to replace pipes, to repair damaged pipes, to add additional piping. And they would be exposed to the insulation on the pipes. They would be exposed to the gaskets that connected the pipes together.

They would hire boilermakers to come in and work on the boilers, and what we call overhauling the boilers, where they would strip down a lot of the materials and then build them back up. Boilers frequently contained what we call refractory material, which is fire brick and some other types of materials that went over the fire brick that frequently contained asbestos.

Electricians would come in and work on electrical wires and cables, and frequently wires and cables that were on furnaces, ovens, the machines that operated the chemical plant. So, usually a chemical plant, any type of chemical plant, would have an operator’s room and operators would work in there and press numerous buttons and perform various activities, and all of that equipment at one time or another required work. And for equipment that was built and supplied in the 60s and 70s, a lot of that equipment contained electrical wire and cable, and electricians would be exposed to those sort of things.

Over the years, those materials, particularly thermal insulation — and thermal insulation is what was on the pipes — those things deteriorate. And frequently, if they’re not either removed, or covered in some way, we would get stories from people that worked in the plant of those materials just falling down on the ground. So you’ve got people that are working in the plant doing all kinds of different activities and just, during the course of their day and doing the work that they perform, insulation falls on them and hits the ground and somebody has to clean that up, and it’s in the air.

And most people aren’t familiar with this kind of process or thermal insulation and how it works. We hear about asbestos, and I think generally everybody knows that asbestos is not something that you want to be exposed to, but people don’t fully appreciate how you can get exposed.

And so, if you’ve got a piece of insulation that’s a hundred feet in the air — and I’m no physicist, and I can’t run those calculations, but — it’s coming down at a pretty high rate of speed and it’s hitting the floor with significant force and all that dust proliferates all over the place. And you’ve got people that are working in the plant. And there’s a concept called entrainment or re-entrainment. And so once that asbestos gets onto a concrete floor or tile floor or onto a piece of machinery, it’s just constantly being re-entrained over the course of a day, unless someone comes in and performs a true industrial hygiene cleaning of the product. That didn’t happen. You have to have special equipment that is used, what we call HEPA filtered vacuums and other pieces of equipment, and that kind of thing didn’t happen. So over the years, there’s asbestos that’s just in the plant and it gets stuck in the duct work.

These facilities, of course, they’re very hot. They have duct work that runs throughout the plant and sometimes they would have even dust collection systems, which I know sounds like a great thing, but what happens with dust collection systems is it all kind of gets sucked into one place. Well, those things have to get sucked in through duct work and piping and things like that. Well, those things don’t get cleaned, and it just filters through the air.

So the long and short of it is, is I think that everybody who worked in that facility probably from close to when it opened in 1961 through the ’90s and into the 2000s had some level of exposure. Some people would have more because they are directly implicated with the asbestos components. Either they’re replacing it, they are disturbing it in some way, but even those folks that really shouldn’t have had any involvement at all are still likely going to have an exposure in some way, just because of the ubiquitous nature of asbestos and how, once it’s in the environment, it’s very difficult to get out.

And it’s not like it got into the general plant, into the air, once. I mean, this was a frequent occurrence. And when it happens, again, it’s just constantly being re-entrained. And unless they made an effort to come in and have a professional company clean it, and then it happened again. People were frequently exposed. And over the years, I’ve been doing this for almost 25 years myself, and we’ve represented a handful of people that were either direct employees of Air Products or people that worked for contractors that had to perform work at Air Products, and they’ve developed various asbestos related diseases, I believe, as a direct result of working at that plant.

What Mesothelioma Patients Should Do Next

John: So if you did work at that plant, whether you were an employee at Air Products & Chemicals, or whether or not, like you said, you were maybe a contractor that came in, did some work at that plant, and now you have mesothelioma, what should you do?

Paul: So there’s a lot of things that people have to focus on. For those who may not know exactly what mesothelioma is, unfortunately, it’s a terminal cancer. It is uniquely associated with asbestos, and there is no known cure for it. There are a lot of different treatments that can prolong people’s lives, improve their quality of life, and things can go pretty quickly for people.

The average life expectancy from diagnosis is 6 months to 18 months. And so people have a lot of things that they have to deal with when this diagnosis comes through. First and foremost, it’s not legal. It has everything to do with their medical care and what plan they’re going to take. And that’s what every person with this disease needs to work out between themselves, their families, and their medical providers. What are they going to do? Where are they going to go?

Unfortunately, in Kentucky, we don’t have a lot of time to pursue our legal rights. We only have a year from the date that we know or should know what caused our disease, or that we have a disease and what caused it, in order to pursue a legal claim. That’s not necessarily one year from the date of diagnosis, but my recommendation is, certainly, you want to file your case within a year of your diagnosis to make sure that there’s no issues.

And while you’re trying to figure out the best way to treat your disease and deal with the emotional component of what it is that you’ve been diagnosed with, you need to pursue your legal rights. And our recommendation is to certainly speak with attorneys that have knowledge concerning asbestos matters in particular, certainly people that have knowledge about the particular locations that you worked at.

I’ve been doing this work for 25 years. My partner’s been doing this work for almost 30 years. And what I’ve learned more than anything is asbestos litigation’s not something that you dabble with. I have a database of documents and materials that we refer to frequently, and it’s important to find someone that has experience with this litigation, hopefully has experience with the particular location that’s at issue, and of course, somebody that you feel comfortable with, somebody that you feel like is going to fight for you and do what is appropriate for you and your family under the circumstances.

Frequently, John, most people aren’t exposed to asbestos at one place. So Air Products, more than likely for most people that would come to me, it would just be one location out of potentially many. It could be the only place for a lifelong employee, but that’s what we’re here to figure out. Lots of times people…it’s not obvious to them where and how they were exposed. I’ll frequently get people that have worked at a place like Air Products for a long time and say, “Gosh, I worked in a control room for 30 years. I don’t know how in the world I could get exposed.” And we dig into it a little bit and we determine, well, they spent a lot of time out in the plant. Just because you spend eight hours a day in the control room, that hour a day outside for 30 years can be a potential source of substantial exposure. And we may identify some other exposures outside. So our recommendation is, unfortunately, move quickly.

There’s a lot of resources out there, and you’ll be able to find lawyers that you’re comfortable with that are knowledgeable. One of our primary goals is for you to be able to participate in your case. And I mentioned a moment ago that the averages are not terrific as to life expectancy beyond or past diagnosis. And I want to be able to take your deposition. I would love to be able to get your case to trial before your health situation deteriorates. And the quicker that we can get started, the better chance we have of getting your deposition in.

And it’s not just so that we can develop proof. And it is true, John, that the best source of proof of someone’s exposure is our client themselves, but we also want to give people the opportunity to tell their story, to let the judge, jury, the defendants, anybody that may watch their testimony, let them know how this has impacted this person and their family.

I can’t emphasize enough, it’s a devastating and tragic diagnosis. And while there’s a lot of good stories out there about people having good outcomes, there’s a lot of terrible stories too, and we want to be able to give people the opportunity to tell the stories themselves, and it’s most effective coming from you, not coming from doctors or even family members and alternative sources.

So you’ve got a lot to deal with, but you do have rights. There is a potential for significant compensation for you and your family during this devastating time of need. And so I encourage people to pursue their legal rights immediately so that they can really increase the likelihood of a meaningful recovery for you and your family.

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

Paul: Thank you, John. I appreciate it.

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.