Shipbuilding and Ship-breaking
Throughout the 20th century, asbestos-containing products were widely used in the shipbuilding industry for insulation, fireproofing and sound-proofing. A classic example was the Queen Mary, an iconic ship belonging to the Cunard White Line, which was built in the 1930s at a Scottish shipyard. Among the asbestos products used during the ship's construction were:
- Newalls' 85% Magnesia and Newtempheit for insulating boilers, turbines, piping and steam lines;
- asbestos pug (15% asbestos, 85% Magnesia) - a fiber-like substance which, when mixed with water on-site, was molded around pinwork;
- pre-formed asbestos sections for application on pipe bends;
- asbestos sheeting applied over layers of asbestos pug;
- asbestos slabs used on pipes and turbines;
- asbestos block on the turbines;
- asbestos rope used on pipework less then ¾" in diameter;
- asbestos cloth for covering pipework;
- asbestos flag wool.
Workers who handled these materials and others who worked onboard when it was applied were put at risk from hazardous exposures generated by the handling and application of these products.
From 1930-1978, 4.5 million workers were employed in U.S. shipyards; during that time 25 million tons of asbestos were used to insulate and fireproof ships. As a result of the occupational exposure they experienced, asbestos-related disease and death has decimated former shipyard workers in the U.S. (See report on Global Asbestos Congress 2004).
Elsewhere, the situation is similar. In 2003, the (UK) Health and Safety Executive confirmed that the one of the highest risk occupations for mesothelioma (asbestos cancer) was shipbuilding (Mesothelioma: A National Tragedy).
The asbestos epidemic is particularly bad in Scotland where, according to one expert: "About 90% of deaths due to mesothelioma are due to exposure in unmonitored settings in the shipbuilding industry." In the shipbuilding center of Yokosuka, Japan many cases of pleural mesothelioma have been diagnosed in former shipyard workers, usually 40+ years after their exposures (see search refs. [1,2] and [3,4,5,6,7], respectively in: Global Asbestos Congress 2004). Australian research covering the period 1986-2000, identified shipbuilding workers as the 5th highest at-risk category. When the number of mesotheliomas amongst personnel from the Navy or Merchant Navy was added to those for shipbuilding and dockyard workers, this became far and away the highest risk category (Mesothelioma: Australian Data & Research).
If done correctly, the decommissioning of end-of-life vessels contaminated with asbestos and other hazardous materials is an expensive process. Seeking to minimize costs, governments have taken advantage of the world's dirtiest industry: the scrapping of toxic ships (Killing the Future - Asbestos Use in Asia).
In 1997, a Pulitzer-prize winning series of articles in the Baltimore Sun newspaper exposed the scandal in ship-breaking yards in the U.S. and Asia. The articles revealed a horrific picture of appalling conditions in America's depressed ports and Indian ship-breaking yards (see The Ship-breaking Industry).
In 2005-2006, the Clemenceau, a 27,000 tonne former flagship of the French Navy, became the focus of international attention as it sailed the high seas looking for a ship-breaking yard to decommission it. The fact that the ship contained up to 1,000 tonnes of asbestos was something the French Government only reluctantly admitted. Inconveniently for French decision makers, the international dumping of such contaminated waste infringes French laws, the Basel Convention, and the European Waste Shipment Regulation. A multinational coalition of asbestos victims' groups, NGOs, trade unions and campaigners forced the French Government to repatriate the ship and, after its fruitless 12,000 mile quest, the Clemenceau returned to its home port in 2006 (The Clemenceau Comes Home!).
In the wake of the Clemenceau, the issue of what to do with end-of-life ships has become a highly sensitive topic (Dismantling & Recycling Decommissioned Ships). The French Government's latest attempt to off-load the Clemenceau ran into problems when a small group of British activists objected to the Ministry of Defense's attempt to dump the problem in Hartlepool. Despite their best efforts, the campaigners eventually lost the legal challenge and The Clemenceau arrived at Able UK's Graythorpe site near Seaton Carew on February 8, 2009 [Clemenceau Debacle Rumbles On!].
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Updated September 2009
