Day 10 Libby, Montana

We drove to Libby, Montana today to try to go see the mine. Unfortunately, they did not allow us to enter because it was too dangerous. Meanwhile, there is a whole town of people still living there. Let that set the premise for this blog.

We ended up meeting at a small park to talk about Libby and the problems with asbestos. Asbestos is a fibrous material that is strong, long-lasting, and heat resistant, which has led to its use in thousands of products. Asbestos causes acute effects such as asbestosis from the fibers getting into the lungs, and chronic effects like lung cancer occur after about 15 years. Long term exposure (25-40 years) to asbestos causes mesothelioma.
There are two rocks associated with asbestos: serpentine and chrysotile. The most common is the form that comes from serpentine. The kind of asbestos in Libby is called amphibole asbestos. It is not a commercially viable mineral, but rather a contaminant in the vermiculite ore found in the Libby mine. Amphibole asbestos breaks apart more easily, and is believed to be more toxic than other types of asbestos. Granite rock was the base for vermiculite and it also contained tremolite and actinolite as impurities. Vermiculite was discovered in Libby in 1881, and in 1919 it was found that vermiculite "popped" when heated, which created pockets of air and made the material suitable for insulation or as a soil additive. By 1940, between 70-80% of all vermiculite in the world was mined from Libby. Zonolite industries knew all of the problems with asbestos and they chose to hide it from the public. When people got sick, they just transferred them to a different job in the mine that's less work- they didn't want to put people on disability because they didn't want whistle-blowers. W.R. Grace bought the company, and they chose to hide information about cancer as well. Eventually, 1 in 40 people in town had an asbestos related disease. W.R. Grace started tracking from 1973 to 1990 there were 88 reported deaths. Bad press in the 1980's led to the decline in demand for asbestos, and the mine was shut down. This is also when lawsuits really began popping up.
Citizens petitioned for the site to be designated a Superfund site, and W.R. Grace was named the responsible party. in 2005, EPA took 7 people from W.R. Grace and charged them with criminal charges, but they were dropped. (I was kind of shocked to hear this.) They removed 900,000 square feet of soil in the area and 1500 houses had to be cleaned. There were hot spots near fields, schools, and the mines, but really it was everywhere; people even used it in their gardens and driveways. We also watched a documentary about the clean up process and how upset people were about having people come in their homes. Emotions run high in Libby, and the community is somewhat skeptical of the EPA. Some people left town, but most stayed. They started logging and doing other things, so life went on in Libby. Unlike Anaconda, Libby had logging to fall back on so they were able to stay and continue to make a living in Libby. Anaconda did not have a secondary resource, and they didn't really bounce back.