Iron Mine Workers at Higher Risk to Develop Mesothelioma Than Previously Thought

Since 1988, 52 Iron miners have died in Minnesota whose mesothelioma cancers have led the state Health Department to conclude that the rare cancer is killing iron ore miners in significantly greater numbers than previously thought.
The state said last week it will try to determine whether the deaths are caused by asbestos or asbestos-like fibers in iron ore dust. They will also examine whether they think limits should be placed on exposure. According to a 2003 study, commercial asbestos used in taconite-plant furnaces and other mining equipment was the probable cause.
When federal air tests found elevated levels of asbestos last September at the Northshore Mining Co. in Silver Bay, Minn., mine safety officials couldn’t issue fines or order safety improvements.
New, stricter rules on asbestos in mines remain stalled, 20 months after being proposed. And under the current airborne asbestos limit, which is 20 times higher than the limit for other industries, Northshore’s processing plant is not in violation.
Now, regulators find themselves under renewed pressure to deal with dusty conditions in iron mining. This week, the state Health Department reported that 52 male Iron Range miners died of mesothelioma, a rare cancer caused by inhaling asbestos, from 1988 to 2005.
Over 200 miners have filed workers’ compensation claims stating that working in the taconite mines caused their asbestos-related diseases and other lung ailments.
“Hopefully it never blossoms,” Karl Oberstar Jr., 55, said of his asbestosis, which was detected in a screening arranged by his union in the late 1990s. He worked 31 years as a millwright and mechanic for LTV Steel Mining Co. in Hoyt Lakes.
Oberstar, who lives in Gilbert, remembers dumping bags of dusty asbestos into “a big mixing bowl” while making a fire-resistant paste to seal furnaces. “You could just see the particles everywhere,” he said. “The air never seemed clear.”
According to workers at the Eveleth Mines and Inland Steel Mining Co. in Virginia, dirt and dust came with the job.
They complained to the company at one point and were eventually given some respirators but they got clogged right away. After that, the company told them it was just harmless dust.
The brake linings of the trucks were asbestos, the ceiling tiles in his office had it, it was in the insulation of the wires that were stripped and it was in this paste that they smeared onto the pipes when they built the taconite plant.
The best course of action it seems for workers at these plants is to get their lungs scanned for signs of disease early to detect tumors as early as possible when treatment might be more effective.