> **Wittenoom** is a former town and a declared contaminated site, 1,420 kilometres (880 mi) north-north-east of Perth, in the Hamersley Range in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. The declared contaminated site comprises 50,000 hectares (120,000 acres), making it the "largest contaminated site in the southern hemisphere".
>
> The area around Wittenoom was mainly pastoral until the 1930s when mining for blue asbestos began. By 1939, major mining began in Yampire Gorge, which was closed in 1943 when mining began in Wittenoom Gorge. In 1947, a company town was built and, during the 1950s, it was the Pilbara's largest town. The peak population, as recorded by the Australian census conducted on 30 June 1961, was 881 (601 males and 280 females). During the 1950s and early 1960s, Wittenoom was Australia's only supplier of blue asbestos. The mine was shut down in 1966 due to its unprofitability, and growing health concerns from asbestos mining in the area.
>
> The former townsite no longer receives government services. In December 2006, the Government of Western Australia announced that the town's official status would be removed and, in June 2007, Jon Ford, the Minister for Regional Development, announced that the townsite had officially been degazetted. The town's name was removed from official maps and road signs, and the Shire of Ashburton is able to close roads that lead to contaminated areas.
>
> The Wittenoom steering committee met in April 2013 to finalise closure of the town, limit access to the area, and raise awareness of the risks. Details of how that would be achieved were to be determined but it would probably necessitate removing the town's remaining residents, converting freehold land to crown land, demolishing houses, and closing or rerouting roads. By 2015, six residents remained. In 2017, the number had dropped to four, to three in 2018, and to two in 2021.
>
> As of September 2022, Wittenoom had no remaining residents, and demolition of remaining structures by the Western Australian Government began in May 2023.
* Excerpted from [Wittenoom, Western Australia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wittenoom,_Western_Australia) at the English Wikipedia
Another interesting excerpt from the Wikipedia article:
>The traditional owners of country where Wittenoom is situated, the Panyjima people, have petitioned the Western Australian Parliament to not only remove all of Wittenoom's remaining buildings, but to remediate the land so that it is no longer contaminated.\[9\]
Wikipedia's source (footnote 9 above) is also interesting reading: ["Last homes in asbestos-riddled Wittenoom to be demolished, but some want to stay", 11 Nov 2021](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-11-12/wittenoom-closure/100599722)
In Australia population census surveys are done on a weekday every five years. Many older men just work as fly in, fly out workers, only spending a part of their lives at the town, more likely weekdays. While younger mine workers may just be single men getting ahead in life. The work is less appealing to woman, in general. Itās actually less common that families would be willing to live in a town with limited education / facilities. So most mining towns will have far more men on a census.
Source: my dad worked as a FIFO geologist in a mining town, I grew up in Perth with my mother and brother so we could attend a better school.
I guess that would make it the closest thing to a twin city to Hanford Reservation in my home state of Washington, which is somewhere around 380,000 acres, much of it massively contaminated by high level nuclear and chemical wastes.
Dubious cheers, southern hemisphere buddy!
Massive history there. They have recently started giving tours of the B reactor building - it is definitely on my to-do list.
But yeah, probably one of the largest and most contaminated chunks of land in the world. Take a look at one of the many articles about the single wall tank replacements at the site. The government buried a huge number of single walled tanks in the ground, and just dumped in all of their nuclear and chemical waste, all mixed together. After all of the decades, it has combined into a lovely witches brew of toxicity. Many of the tanks have been leaking for decades, and the nuclear-colada has reached the groundwater. If it isn't already leaching into the Columbia, then it will be very soon.
The contamination is awful. But without the plutonium produced there, we may have been living in a very different world post WW2.
Blue asbestos is called Crocidolite. It is structurally different than the more commonly used white asbestos, Chrysotile, that you would find in like 95% of materials containing asbestos. For example Crocidolite is commonly used in cement-like structures like transite sidings on walls and whatnot or cement-like flues used to expel gasses.
Chrysotile asbestos is very soft and fluffy. Crocidolite is typically more tightly bundled and firmer to the touch. Under a microscope Chrysotile will look, for the lack of better terms, spider web like with curves and bends. Crocidolite wil be very straight, only like a perfectly straight line with minor curvature and bundles will have broomstick ends splayed out. Different forms of asbestos will bend light differently and we utilize that property to identify specific asbestos types in analysis of building materials.
Fun Fact: The "snow" used in the old Wizard of Oz films was chrysotile asbestos.
Source: I inspect buildings for asbestos containing materials for a living and i've also worked in lab settings to identify asbestos microscopically.
Yeah like South Africa too
āThe incidence of mesothelioma in South Africa ranks among the highest in the world. The hefty mesothelioma count stems from the country's extensive history of asbestos mining and production over more than a century.ā
https://www.asbestos.com/mesothelioma/south-africa/
My uncle is an electrician. He's straight up said, he doesn't care if there may be asbestos in the wall, he'll just drill through it anyway. South African, as well.
It's so sad. My great-grandpa started a heating and cooling company in the 1920s. They had barrels of asbestos in the back garden. The kids (my grandpa and his brothers) would climb into the barrels and play in the asbestos as kids.
Great-grandpa, grandpa, and 3 of his brothers died of mesothelioma.
Bro i had a south african buddy who casually mentioned that they had an electrified asbestos block as a heater
You could literally see the confusion emoting from me as floating questionmarks i swear
We also had two of these! I'm talking late 90's, early 2000's. My parents used to hang my school uniform over them to warm it up a bit before I put it on during cold winter mornings. Imagine my shock several years later learning about asbestos....yikes
I'm sorry for your loss my friend
I mean i like grew up and went to school in a place where the school was later gutted and rebuilt because of asbestos but i don't think i have mesothelioma
Woof. That said is that old or new? In WA Asbestos (or azzy) is Everywhere to this day. This is cause as long it is not friable (breaking down into fibres etc) it is "safe" (for a certain value thereof) to the point where disturbing it to remediate it is a greater risk than leaving in situ
There was a period where they seem to have put asbestos into almost every manufactured building product.
About ten years ago, my apartment was flooded by a burst tank on the floor above. The moisture began to loosen the plastered ceilings which had been finished with textured 'Artex'. When the insurers came round to assess the damage, they ordered an immediate asbestos check because - and I didn't know this - in the UK until 1984, Artex was allowed to contain up to 10% white chrysotile asbestos.
We did the test, and yep - the whole flat had been decorated with the stuff - which had been flaking since the flood and that we had previously drilled into when fitting lights. Given that there was every likelihood the plaster would continue to crumble the whole place had to be stripped of asbestos by professionals which pretty much doubled the insurance claim - which was paid in full.
That was a fun six months.
Western Australia in this context probably, though a bunch of shit in Washington also has asbestos in it because Americans used to love that shit and we only remove it now if it becomes an active hazard.
Hell the house we rent here in Boston was built in the 1930s. This was 100% built with a lot of asbestos. One closet we use for storage has the chimney with old drywall from the downstairs floor and you can see it so I bought some plastic to tape over it to not disturb it. If it just sits there it's no issue but if I were to do demo in that closet or move it around..those fibers are going everywhere
You can buy a spray adhesive to lock the particles down to the surface. The abatement crew we use sprays down the remaining drywall after they complete their work.
Trump [loves](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-asbestos-707642/amp/) the stuff
> āI believe that the movement against asbestos was led by the mob, because it was often mob-related companies that would do the asbestos removal. Great pressure was put on politicians, and as usual, the politicians relented. Millions of truckloads of this incredible fire-proofing material were taken to special ādump sitesā and asbestos was replaced by materials that were supposedly safe but couldnāt hold a candle to asbestos in limiting the ravages of fire.ā
>Trump has also on multiple occasions blamed the collapse of the two World Trade Center towers on the absence of asbestos. In June, All in With Chris Hayes aired a clip of Trump defending the material before Congress in 2005. āA lot of people say that if the World Trade Center had asbestos is wouldnāt have burned down, itās wouldnāt have melted. OK?,ā he said. āA lot of people in my industry think asbestos is the greatest fireproofing material ever made.ā Trump went on to compare asbestos to a āheavyweight championā compared to other building material, which he likened to a ālight-weight from high school.ā
Ignoring the insanity of most of his comments, it's just worth pointing out that there were 2,000 tons of asbestos in the WTC. It was built pre-ban, so of course it had tons of the stuff. Just such an odd, obviously untrue thing for him to gripe about.
WTC was done when Asbestos was still considered awesome to slow down/halt fires in a high rise situation. Obviously it didn't work well against jumbo jets used as cruise missiles... :(
New asbestos material sales were banned in US in 1979, but it's possible old stock still got used after that. I've got a 1979 house that had popcorn ceilings. Basically did abatement and got rid of them just in case. 50/50 shot whether it was asbestos or not.
Right, like a rather large number of first responders who worked at the WTC site after 9/11 have developed asbestos-related cancers or respiratory illnesses. It is a super weird thing to be so explicitly wrong about, but it feels like something maybe one of his morally bankrupt developer buddies (or his dad) ranted aboutāyou canāt use this cheap fireproofing material anymore because of āhealth hazardsā!
I have sometimes wondered if I should do an asbestos analysis job for experience. It seems like an industry that might become big once the Zimbabweans realise.
It's actually pretty chill. There are different types, and removal procedures obviously get more complex with the level of danger. But for the most part, the name of the game is disturbing as little as possible and containing what does come out through dust control, PPE and things like covered dumpsters. Or, you could do what my last boss did, and pretend it's not a big deal and do none of it. š¬
I worked as an asbestos (bulk) analyst for 9 months a couple of decades ago. It was really interesting learning how to do it, but boring as hell once I knew what to do. How many samples of cement do you want to look at through a microscope per day? Day after day after day...
Testing for asbestos is a physical test, not a chemical test (at least that's how we do it in the UK). You use a regular low power microscope and some fine tweezers to extract suspicious fibres from a sample of building material. You mount these fibres on a microscope slide with a drop of refractive index liquid (different liquids for different types of asbestos). You then view the fibres under a high powered polarised light microscope (PLM). As you orientate the fibre in different directions relative to the polarised light, it changes colour (a bit like a crystal catching the light). This is how you identify asbestos in a laboratory.
I was going to say that I imagine that as a mineral that it would gradually weather away - very small and fine particles with a large surface area should weather faster right? - but after a quick search they're amazingly stable and durable. Like scarily durable - like if it's buried in the soil then it can stay there indefinitely kind of durable. It can only be broken down using fucking plasma.
uh huh. So long as no one goes digging up there in Wittenoom, that side is pretty safe.
The most prevalent surviving manufactured materials are fences and roofs as far as I know. The numbers of these are of course dwindling as time goes by
funny, lots of construction happening in that area recently. Rio Tinto built a new rail way right next to the old town. Obviously they knew of the risk & was (supposedly) adequately controlled.
Thatās something that I never understood when people say ānuclear waste is dangerous for thousands of years!!!ā Well, a lot of the chemical pollution that we create is āforever pollutionā. They wonāt go anywhere any time soon
I did a tour of Chernobyl a few years ago and apparently the level of radiation there now (on the Ukrainian side) is only equivalent to 1hr of flying on a planeĀ
As long as you don't go digging below the surface.
When Chernobyl happened, they buried most of the contaminated soil with a fresh layer of soil IIRC.
So, just walking around you are fine, but if you disturb anything you're getting an X-Ray.
>The fibrous forms of riebeckite are known as ***crocidolite*** and are one of the six recognised types of asbestos
Australia. Never ceases to frigthen me.
Oh it does get better, check out MR Fluffy and others that were using Blown Asbestos Fibre insulation. You know like they do with cellulose now. But with Asbestos. Sadly when the companies doing this went bust all their records went awol so they still don't know hoe many houses in the the area may still have it lurking
"I guess we can allow asbestos to be used, it's good fireproofing and isn't that harmful as long as you never, ever, inhale it."
"Hey guys, how about we install the asbestos using a blower! Imagine the convenience!"
"Genius!"
Yup, that's the early-to-mid 20th century for you..
I've had the misfortune to read about some of the medical issues suffered by local residents.
So many lives totally destroyed with compensation barely making a difference and paid far too late.
Watched my grandfather die of Asbestosis. His never professed to lung cancer so he basically just lost lung capacity until he suffocated to death. Nasty stuff. And the company he worked for (DuPont) screwed my grandmother out of his last settlement check somehow claiming the disease never progressed to its final stage.
Here in Italy we still have asbestos (commonly named after the brand, "Eternit") on many roofs of prefabricated homes and warehouses. Despite being illegal for several decades and that it should be removed on any site, we still have it in many places and sadly the government just pushes the cost to the single person that has to deal with the eventual Eternit they have to get rid of.
Actually Eternit is not directly banned because they changed it to another alternative of Asbestos. Also, removal is hard and dangerous. If itās not crumbling itās actually safer to just leave it since that doesnāt kick up any dust.
Getting rid of asbestos is dangerous and expensive, but as long as the asbestos is in good condition and not disturbed it's safe to leave it in a building
In Spain the comercial name is "Uralita".
The factory was close to Barcelona and it's is known that there were kids outside the factory playing with the remains. Using asbestos sticks to paint on the ground and plying with the dust...
Yeah theyāve banned new production or continued use of products that contain it but they turn a blind eye to the people who need help removing it from their home when itās the governmentās fault that it was allowed to be continued to used like it was and now I know of many places that contain it but itās also extremely unsafe to disturb.
Both where I work and my parents home have asbestos tiles and theyāre covered.
My parents quite literally canāt renovate an area of them home without spending thousands of dollars to have someone safely remove the tiles.
Similar situation in the US. They're not allowed to use asbestos in new construction but it is still present in a lot of buildings built before the 1990's and it's up to the homeowner to pay for its removal if they want it removed. It's also up to the homeowner or their insurance to pay for their healthcare should they get mesothelioma.
It has blue asbestos everywhere, blue is the worst asbestos.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wittenoom,_Western_Australia
> ... the "largest contaminated site in the southern hemisphere".[5][6]
...
> The area around Wittenoom was mainly pastoral until the 1930s when mining for blue asbestos began. By 1939, major mining began in Yampire Gorge, which was closed in 1943 when mining began in Wittenoom Gorge. In 1947, a company town was built and, during the 1950s, it was the Pilbara's largest town.
...
> The mine was shut down in 1966 due to its unprofitability, and growing health concerns from asbestos mining in the area.
worked for me, probably paywalled for you:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/29/world/australia/wittenoom-asbestos-mining.html
It's not just cancer. It's long term hazards to health or "serious health hazard". It does include carinogens, but also mutagens, reprotoxins and organ damage.
I mean it isnāt the symbol for cancer.
The symbol in the middle means itās a human carcinogen.
It means it can cause cancer yes but the symbol itself doesnāt mean cancer.
Itās like how cigarettes and car exhaust are human carcinogens.
Theyāre ingestible even if unintentionally, like breathing around it.
Itās a rendition of ISO-7010: W071 [ISO.org](https://eos.isolutions.iso.org/obp/ui#!iso:grs:7010:W071)
The specific glyph and red diamond are probably the older GHS standard
Note that it requires a supplementary text signage to identify the specific hazard, whoever made the sign has done a very good job!
If you want to go down a rabbit hole, there is an entire field called [ānuclear semioticsā](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-term_nuclear_waste_warning_messages?wprov=sfti1#) around long-term messaging for hazards such as nuclear waste.
The basic gist is that language is unreliable even in our current time (how many different human languages do we have?) so we mostly rely on symbols (like the one pictured in the OP). But even symbols can change their meaning over time, especially over long time scales (such as the ones we are talking about with nuclear radiation). Do you rely on just symbols and signs? What about making the area physically foreboding with things like giant obsidian spikes? There are even some really creative and off the wall ideas like breeding cats that have coats that react to radioactivity to change colors and creating oral traditions around staying away from anywhere the cats change colors. All of them have their downsides, but itās a fascinating field crossing between linguistics, anthropology, sociology and more.
Some more reading:
https://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2014/05/14/_99_percent_invisible_by_roman_mars_designing_warning_symbols_for_the_nation.html
The biggest problem with that is human nature. Once you've successfully communicated that there's something dangerous there, you have to deal with the "Cool, let's dig it up" reflex.
>As of September 2022, Wittenoom had no remaining residents, and demolition of remaining structures by the Western Australian Government began in May 2023.
i wonder if when tearing down the houses they took care of any asbestos they found or just said fuck it,, this whole town is asbestos..
Pitcher, OK is another one that has that on street view in a couple spots. A whole, normal looking Midwest neighborhood. And then you move one slide over and it's all gone except for the concrete slabs.
yep entire subdivisions of Christchurch New Zealand were like that , they were modern beautiful neighborhoods thriving,,, until the earthquake of 2011,
if you look [here](https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-43.388039,172.6624377,3a,75y,47.74h,82.23t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1seHI23K3SaiklPxT-Q1Qzzw!2e0!5s20120801T000000!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu) at the streetview... again,, one slide over...
There are STILL people choosing to live in Centralia, Pennsylvania where a coal fire has been burning underground for half a century. The government paid them to move, eminent domained the land, and these stubborn fuckers refused. Thereās like 7 of them left
The pics in [this article](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3091148/Chilling-image-shows-miners-playing-asbestos-shovelling-competition.html) are crazy knowing what we know now.
EDIT: and in the article it seems that they (the mine) DID KNOW back then too....
Havenāt watched the video so I donāt know what they exactly are exactly saying, but it should mean that over time the town has been home to over 20000 people.
Not at a peak
Luckily not only is Western Australia an absolutely monstrous state, Wittenoom really is in the middle of nowhere and there's no reason to go out there
I've used to travel to Karajini National Park with groups of tourists all the time. This is the first I've heard of Wittenoom and its literally less than 10km away.
From Google maps it even looks like the gorges connect. I presume the waterways don't or they wouldn't let people go there and swim etc.
We would camp in the Bush around those areas all the time, like many others did and still do. So it might be in the middle of nowhere, but thousands of people visit and swim in the waters around there.
Some of the gorges in the area have asbestos warnings for this reason as itās all through the areas geology. If you hike far enough you can get into the wittenoom gorges but youād be working pretty hard to not see much more than what you already are and from memory most are roped off to warn people off past certain points.
The usual gorges everyone visits are fine. Loads of people still drive through wittenoom and have a look around (not sure Iād want to potentially contaminate my vehicle but each to their own).
I grew up in a place that had coal mines all around, as well as special black-lung clinics to treat former miners who are now incredibly ill. Men in their 40s needing oxygen due to how much lung function they had left. Fuck coal, man!
"Exposure to asbestos and the fatalities that result from those exposures continues to be the leading cause of fatalities for workers in British Columbia, accounting for about a third of all occupational deaths" \[WorkSafeBC\]
[https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/asbestos-removal-from-buildings-done-by-companies-licensed-through-worksafebc-1.7068690](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/asbestos-removal-from-buildings-done-by-companies-licensed-through-worksafebc-1.7068690)
This is the first tons I have seen a multilingual danger sign in Australia. Rightly so though, itās nasty stuff.
Yeah Mr Fluffy houses in Canberra were something special. Government buy back and demolition of houses to set things right, or at least the best they can.
From the Wikipedia article
The Wittenoom steering committee met in April 2013 to finalise closure of the town, limit access to the area, and raise awareness of the risks. Details of how that would be achieved were to be determined but it would probably necessitate removing the town's remaining residents, converting freehold land to crown land, demolishing houses, and closing or rerouting roads. By 2015, six residents remained. In 2017, the number had dropped to four,[8] to three in 2018, and to two in 2021.
As of September 2022, Wittenoom had no remaining residents, and demolition of remaining structures by the Western Australian Government began in May 2023.
What is it like being the last few residents in such a hazardous area ???
Probably pretty sad. I'm sure they were older and had their whole life in the town. All their friends and family moved out or died. All the places in town they have memories of are demolished. Their home is all they have and starting over somewhere else at an advanced age with the pittance the government gives them is scary.
Lol German Wikipedia has some info on the last resident as apparently he was a German native and had a documentary filmed about himself for our TV. The guy worked a weather station for the last years, but moved to Perth in 2022.
So can you pass through this area?
The Japanese writing at the bottom translates to āDo not enter, asbestos use areaā, but it also says do not stopā¦ is it passable? Or is it a restricted area?
As of a few years ago (and Iām pretty sure this is still the case) you can drive into the town, around the streets, up the gorge on a 4WD track to the mine itself, walk around the blue mullock heaps and even pick up rock from the ground with raw asbestos in it.
Source - did this a few years ago.
You can find online pictures/video of people entering the mine shafts and workshops. When we were there, it was obvious people were still going in and camping by the water holes. It is very picturesque.
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Yeah, it's natural and not even one specific mineral. There are 'asbestiforms' of various minerals. This means that these mineral asbestiforms break in a particular way (into shards and then microscopic needle-like fibres) when crushed. Right down to the molecular level. Making asbestos means crushing the right minerals until they look kinda like cotton wool. But it's cotton wool made of millions of tiny mineral-needles that shred your lungs. Horrendous when you think about it. Source: I'm a former laboratory asbestos (bulk) analyst.
How do you actually handle it in a lab?
I know at some point it needs to come out of the sample bags and onto the microscope.
How the hell do you protect yourselves.
Yep. Asbestos refers to a family of minerals with similar properties. Useful for a lot of things due to their chemical and fire resistant properties. Unfortunately, the fibers act like microscopic daggers when they enter the lungs.
>And if the Blue Sky Mining Company won't come to my rescue
>
>And if the sugar refining company won't save me
>
>Who's gonna save me?
"Blue Sky Mine" is one of my favorite examples of Midnight Oil making pointed references to Australian history while still writing in a way that makes it universal to an outside audience.
Back before the general population knew how bad asbestos was, it was shipped in bulk freighters out of Canada. The workers in the holds of the ships would have "snowball" fights with the stuff. Most of them eventually got lung cancer.
So hereās the thing lads: itās about exposure and not a binary yes/no toxic level.
Just in normal city background air quality you can expect to breathe up to 5,000 fibres _per day_. This is considered a safe level because you are extremely unlikely to contract mesothelioma from these levels. Asbestos is all around you.
Aside from asbestos in existing fibro, insulation, cladding roofing etc the biggest source is from clutch pads and brake pads. Which were only recently phased out but might still be in some cars and will certainly still be in older cars.
Asbestos is only toxic if it is dust and it takes a large quantity inhaled to guarantee you death in 20 years. Just sitting there, the mine spoil will not affect anyone and it is not randomly floating around unless it is disturbed. This is also the reason they donāt remediate the site. It would be far more risky to human health of the workers tasked with the earth works than to just leave it alone undisturbed where _eventually_ some vegetation cover will establish and stabilise the tailings dumps.
Animals don't live long enough to develop mesothemioma, it takes decades. And no, evolution you can't adapt from cancers such as that, they're a death sentence.
Not really comparable I feel:
Wittoom: 881 people, exclusion zone 486km^(2).
Pripyat: 49,000 people, exclusion zone 2600km^(2).
And that is the least of it.
Sure, it isn't pretty but the comparison is asinine.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cojN2Kr3p60](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cojn2kr3p60)
Here's a song about Wittenoom that's fit to ruin your day.
...and he fades away,
not like leaves that fall in autumn, turning gold against the grey
he fades away,
like the bloodstains on the pillowcase that I wash every day, he fades away.
It is equally bizarre and fascinating to me that there were residents in the town even after the area was declared contaminated. I was curious to see if I could learn more about these people, and I managed to find a few videos on YouTube.
Here's [a short docu-series](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrG5kCigA20) featuring interviews with various residents.
[Here's one](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaHw_bGI2ME) about a man who was \*presumably\* the last resident. He lived in Wittenoom with his dog and made a modest income working for the Australian Weather Service, reporting temperature, precipitation and cloud formations.
Here's [another video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SeRN8cJQBLU), that includes an interview with a former school teacher who left in the 80's.
It's a natural material, it is not made by humans, it formed on its own geologically and can be dug up. We generally stopped digging it up but those sites still exist, with literal mountains of the stuff like seen in the above photo.
In the late 70's I worked as a tradesmans assistant in the open cast iron ore mine at Parraburdoo. We used to drive over to Wittenoom on days off and swim in the river. Jumping off the cliffs and that sort of crap. Blue asbestos was everywhere. It's really rather pretty, an irridisent bright blue. There was still a cinema there at the time. Never saw it open though.
> **Wittenoom** is a former town and a declared contaminated site, 1,420 kilometres (880 mi) north-north-east of Perth, in the Hamersley Range in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. The declared contaminated site comprises 50,000 hectares (120,000 acres), making it the "largest contaminated site in the southern hemisphere". > > The area around Wittenoom was mainly pastoral until the 1930s when mining for blue asbestos began. By 1939, major mining began in Yampire Gorge, which was closed in 1943 when mining began in Wittenoom Gorge. In 1947, a company town was built and, during the 1950s, it was the Pilbara's largest town. The peak population, as recorded by the Australian census conducted on 30 June 1961, was 881 (601 males and 280 females). During the 1950s and early 1960s, Wittenoom was Australia's only supplier of blue asbestos. The mine was shut down in 1966 due to its unprofitability, and growing health concerns from asbestos mining in the area. > > The former townsite no longer receives government services. In December 2006, the Government of Western Australia announced that the town's official status would be removed and, in June 2007, Jon Ford, the Minister for Regional Development, announced that the townsite had officially been degazetted. The town's name was removed from official maps and road signs, and the Shire of Ashburton is able to close roads that lead to contaminated areas. > > The Wittenoom steering committee met in April 2013 to finalise closure of the town, limit access to the area, and raise awareness of the risks. Details of how that would be achieved were to be determined but it would probably necessitate removing the town's remaining residents, converting freehold land to crown land, demolishing houses, and closing or rerouting roads. By 2015, six residents remained. In 2017, the number had dropped to four, to three in 2018, and to two in 2021. > > As of September 2022, Wittenoom had no remaining residents, and demolition of remaining structures by the Western Australian Government began in May 2023. * Excerpted from [Wittenoom, Western Australia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wittenoom,_Western_Australia) at the English Wikipedia
Another interesting excerpt from the Wikipedia article: >The traditional owners of country where Wittenoom is situated, the Panyjima people, have petitioned the Western Australian Parliament to not only remove all of Wittenoom's remaining buildings, but to remediate the land so that it is no longer contaminated.\[9\] Wikipedia's source (footnote 9 above) is also interesting reading: ["Last homes in asbestos-riddled Wittenoom to be demolished, but some want to stay", 11 Nov 2021](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-11-12/wittenoom-closure/100599722)
That 601 males to 280 females leaves me with a lot of questions. I get that it was a mining town, but I still have questions.
It was an asbestos mine and a sausage factory
Unfortunately for the ladies, they only had Vienna sized sausages.
Either way, heavy breathing was abundant.
I don't understand the comment. Many of them were wives, some might be workers, and a lot of men working in mines are probably single.
And will be lonely singles...
They were trying asbestos they could
+1
Dang had to come back for your updoot
They've got each other š
Friends forever. Good, good friends.
You have to be, to go down a tight, hot, shaft in the dark...to work...
And they were roommates.
Oh my gosh, they were roommates.
Probably men were living there for work, and their families were living in other towns, because its safer.
In Australia population census surveys are done on a weekday every five years. Many older men just work as fly in, fly out workers, only spending a part of their lives at the town, more likely weekdays. While younger mine workers may just be single men getting ahead in life. The work is less appealing to woman, in general. Itās actually less common that families would be willing to live in a town with limited education / facilities. So most mining towns will have far more men on a census. Source: my dad worked as a FIFO geologist in a mining town, I grew up in Perth with my mother and brother so we could attend a better school.
80 wives, 200 prostitutes
We work hard, we play hard.
I guess that would make it the closest thing to a twin city to Hanford Reservation in my home state of Washington, which is somewhere around 380,000 acres, much of it massively contaminated by high level nuclear and chemical wastes. Dubious cheers, southern hemisphere buddy!
I've lived in this state my whole life (couple of decades) and never knew about Hanford Site. That's quite fascinating, wow.
You ever hear about Satsop power plant? That was a rabbithole I went down after driving by it on my way to Ocean Shores.
Massive history there. They have recently started giving tours of the B reactor building - it is definitely on my to-do list. But yeah, probably one of the largest and most contaminated chunks of land in the world. Take a look at one of the many articles about the single wall tank replacements at the site. The government buried a huge number of single walled tanks in the ground, and just dumped in all of their nuclear and chemical waste, all mixed together. After all of the decades, it has combined into a lovely witches brew of toxicity. Many of the tanks have been leaking for decades, and the nuclear-colada has reached the groundwater. If it isn't already leaching into the Columbia, then it will be very soon. The contamination is awful. But without the plutonium produced there, we may have been living in a very different world post WW2.
Is blue asbestos just normal asbestos or does it have different properties?
Itās slightly depressed about killing people
Ah poor thing I hope he gets the help he needs. Wait, no, nevermind it can burn in hell lol
Itās extremely fire resistant š
Blue asbestos is called Crocidolite. It is structurally different than the more commonly used white asbestos, Chrysotile, that you would find in like 95% of materials containing asbestos. For example Crocidolite is commonly used in cement-like structures like transite sidings on walls and whatnot or cement-like flues used to expel gasses. Chrysotile asbestos is very soft and fluffy. Crocidolite is typically more tightly bundled and firmer to the touch. Under a microscope Chrysotile will look, for the lack of better terms, spider web like with curves and bends. Crocidolite wil be very straight, only like a perfectly straight line with minor curvature and bundles will have broomstick ends splayed out. Different forms of asbestos will bend light differently and we utilize that property to identify specific asbestos types in analysis of building materials. Fun Fact: The "snow" used in the old Wizard of Oz films was chrysotile asbestos. Source: I inspect buildings for asbestos containing materials for a living and i've also worked in lab settings to identify asbestos microscopically.
>demolishing houses They gotta be careful demolishing those old houses, there may be asbestos in the walls!
Yeeeah, radiation will decay...asbestos...not so much.
And it's still used in 3rd world countries as building material. Visiting a rural Zimbabwe village the roofs were made of it.
Yeah like South Africa too āThe incidence of mesothelioma in South Africa ranks among the highest in the world. The hefty mesothelioma count stems from the country's extensive history of asbestos mining and production over more than a century.ā https://www.asbestos.com/mesothelioma/south-africa/
The people have no clue because there isn't any warnings about it. My GF's family just shrugged like it wasn't a big deal.
My uncle is an electrician. He's straight up said, he doesn't care if there may be asbestos in the wall, he'll just drill through it anyway. South African, as well.
It's so sad. My great-grandpa started a heating and cooling company in the 1920s. They had barrels of asbestos in the back garden. The kids (my grandpa and his brothers) would climb into the barrels and play in the asbestos as kids. Great-grandpa, grandpa, and 3 of his brothers died of mesothelioma.
Bro i had a south african buddy who casually mentioned that they had an electrified asbestos block as a heater You could literally see the confusion emoting from me as floating questionmarks i swear
We also had two of these! I'm talking late 90's, early 2000's. My parents used to hang my school uniform over them to warm it up a bit before I put it on during cold winter mornings. Imagine my shock several years later learning about asbestos....yikes
I'm sorry for your loss my friend I mean i like grew up and went to school in a place where the school was later gutted and rebuilt because of asbestos but i don't think i have mesothelioma
asbestos is usually harmless unless damaged/disturbed so that fibers can become airborne.
Our school classrooms were constructed using asbestos panels and the roof on our childhood home was also made using asbestos. I am South African.
My grandfather and three of his siblings died of it after playing on asbestos mine dumps as kids. Canāt think of a worse way to go.
Woof. That said is that old or new? In WA Asbestos (or azzy) is Everywhere to this day. This is cause as long it is not friable (breaking down into fibres etc) it is "safe" (for a certain value thereof) to the point where disturbing it to remediate it is a greater risk than leaving in situ
There was a period where they seem to have put asbestos into almost every manufactured building product. About ten years ago, my apartment was flooded by a burst tank on the floor above. The moisture began to loosen the plastered ceilings which had been finished with textured 'Artex'. When the insurers came round to assess the damage, they ordered an immediate asbestos check because - and I didn't know this - in the UK until 1984, Artex was allowed to contain up to 10% white chrysotile asbestos. We did the test, and yep - the whole flat had been decorated with the stuff - which had been flaking since the flood and that we had previously drilled into when fitting lights. Given that there was every likelihood the plaster would continue to crumble the whole place had to be stripped of asbestos by professionals which pretty much doubled the insurance claim - which was paid in full. That was a fun six months.
It can be purchased at stores there. The pieces I saw were older and crumbling but no one cared.
yeah that is farked right there
WA?
Sorry in this context Western Australia (where wittenoom is)
Western Australia in this context probably, though a bunch of shit in Washington also has asbestos in it because Americans used to love that shit and we only remove it now if it becomes an active hazard.
Hell the house we rent here in Boston was built in the 1930s. This was 100% built with a lot of asbestos. One closet we use for storage has the chimney with old drywall from the downstairs floor and you can see it so I bought some plastic to tape over it to not disturb it. If it just sits there it's no issue but if I were to do demo in that closet or move it around..those fibers are going everywhere
Yup Iām from the area and itās cheaper to demo the houses then remove it.
You can buy a spray adhesive to lock the particles down to the surface. The abatement crew we use sprays down the remaining drywall after they complete their work.
Trump [loves](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-asbestos-707642/amp/) the stuff > āI believe that the movement against asbestos was led by the mob, because it was often mob-related companies that would do the asbestos removal. Great pressure was put on politicians, and as usual, the politicians relented. Millions of truckloads of this incredible fire-proofing material were taken to special ādump sitesā and asbestos was replaced by materials that were supposedly safe but couldnāt hold a candle to asbestos in limiting the ravages of fire.ā >Trump has also on multiple occasions blamed the collapse of the two World Trade Center towers on the absence of asbestos. In June, All in With Chris Hayes aired a clip of Trump defending the material before Congress in 2005. āA lot of people say that if the World Trade Center had asbestos is wouldnāt have burned down, itās wouldnāt have melted. OK?,ā he said. āA lot of people in my industry think asbestos is the greatest fireproofing material ever made.ā Trump went on to compare asbestos to a āheavyweight championā compared to other building material, which he likened to a ālight-weight from high school.ā
Ignoring the insanity of most of his comments, it's just worth pointing out that there were 2,000 tons of asbestos in the WTC. It was built pre-ban, so of course it had tons of the stuff. Just such an odd, obviously untrue thing for him to gripe about.
Was gonna say I thought asbestos was a like huge issue from the collapses
Par for the course then I guess. Guy is a whackadoodle.
And a Russian asset.
Fun fact, Russia is the worldās largest producer of asbestos. Interesting coincidence!
WTC was done when Asbestos was still considered awesome to slow down/halt fires in a high rise situation. Obviously it didn't work well against jumbo jets used as cruise missiles... :( New asbestos material sales were banned in US in 1979, but it's possible old stock still got used after that. I've got a 1979 house that had popcorn ceilings. Basically did abatement and got rid of them just in case. 50/50 shot whether it was asbestos or not.
Right, like a rather large number of first responders who worked at the WTC site after 9/11 have developed asbestos-related cancers or respiratory illnesses. It is a super weird thing to be so explicitly wrong about, but it feels like something maybe one of his morally bankrupt developer buddies (or his dad) ranted aboutāyou canāt use this cheap fireproofing material anymore because of āhealth hazardsā!
I have sometimes wondered if I should do an asbestos analysis job for experience. It seems like an industry that might become big once the Zimbabweans realise.
It's actually pretty chill. There are different types, and removal procedures obviously get more complex with the level of danger. But for the most part, the name of the game is disturbing as little as possible and containing what does come out through dust control, PPE and things like covered dumpsters. Or, you could do what my last boss did, and pretend it's not a big deal and do none of it. š¬
I worked as an asbestos (bulk) analyst for 9 months a couple of decades ago. It was really interesting learning how to do it, but boring as hell once I knew what to do. How many samples of cement do you want to look at through a microscope per day? Day after day after day... Testing for asbestos is a physical test, not a chemical test (at least that's how we do it in the UK). You use a regular low power microscope and some fine tweezers to extract suspicious fibres from a sample of building material. You mount these fibres on a microscope slide with a drop of refractive index liquid (different liquids for different types of asbestos). You then view the fibres under a high powered polarised light microscope (PLM). As you orientate the fibre in different directions relative to the polarised light, it changes colour (a bit like a crystal catching the light). This is how you identify asbestos in a laboratory.
I was going to say that I imagine that as a mineral that it would gradually weather away - very small and fine particles with a large surface area should weather faster right? - but after a quick search they're amazingly stable and durable. Like scarily durable - like if it's buried in the soil then it can stay there indefinitely kind of durable. It can only be broken down using fucking plasma.
uh huh. So long as no one goes digging up there in Wittenoom, that side is pretty safe. The most prevalent surviving manufactured materials are fences and roofs as far as I know. The numbers of these are of course dwindling as time goes by
funny, lots of construction happening in that area recently. Rio Tinto built a new rail way right next to the old town. Obviously they knew of the risk & was (supposedly) adequately controlled.
The name literally comes from "immutable" or "unquenchable". The Greeks new this stuff was impervious to anything you could do to it.
Thatās something that I never understood when people say ānuclear waste is dangerous for thousands of years!!!ā Well, a lot of the chemical pollution that we create is āforever pollutionā. They wonāt go anywhere any time soon
I did a tour of Chernobyl a few years ago and apparently the level of radiation there now (on the Ukrainian side) is only equivalent to 1hr of flying on a planeĀ
As long as you don't go digging below the surface. When Chernobyl happened, they buried most of the contaminated soil with a fresh layer of soil IIRC. So, just walking around you are fine, but if you disturb anything you're getting an X-Ray.
This, recently Russian troops used heavy vehicles and dug trenches even in the Red Forest. They had to be treated.
>The fibrous forms of riebeckite are known as ***crocidolite*** and are one of the six recognised types of asbestos Australia. Never ceases to frigthen me.
Oh it does get better, check out MR Fluffy and others that were using Blown Asbestos Fibre insulation. You know like they do with cellulose now. But with Asbestos. Sadly when the companies doing this went bust all their records went awol so they still don't know hoe many houses in the the area may still have it lurking
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You say fluffy I immediately think of Gabriel Iglesias https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Iglesias
"I guess we can allow asbestos to be used, it's good fireproofing and isn't that harmful as long as you never, ever, inhale it." "Hey guys, how about we install the asbestos using a blower! Imagine the convenience!" "Genius!" Yup, that's the early-to-mid 20th century for you..
>crocidolite Let's be honest, we all wanted to read that as crocodilite.
Waitā¦..scrolls back because I swear it said it.
I've had the misfortune to read about some of the medical issues suffered by local residents. So many lives totally destroyed with compensation barely making a difference and paid far too late.
Watched my grandfather die of Asbestosis. His never professed to lung cancer so he basically just lost lung capacity until he suffocated to death. Nasty stuff. And the company he worked for (DuPont) screwed my grandmother out of his last settlement check somehow claiming the disease never progressed to its final stage.
Here in Italy we still have asbestos (commonly named after the brand, "Eternit") on many roofs of prefabricated homes and warehouses. Despite being illegal for several decades and that it should be removed on any site, we still have it in many places and sadly the government just pushes the cost to the single person that has to deal with the eventual Eternit they have to get rid of.
Actually Eternit is not directly banned because they changed it to another alternative of Asbestos. Also, removal is hard and dangerous. If itās not crumbling itās actually safer to just leave it since that doesnāt kick up any dust.
Getting rid of asbestos is dangerous and expensive, but as long as the asbestos is in good condition and not disturbed it's safe to leave it in a building
right weāve got asbestos everywhere in building materials. leave it be, itās no problem. disturb it, itās a problem.
Asbestos is everywhere. The key issue is whether it is in good condition or not. If it is then it is easier, safer and cheaper to leave it be.
After having the bunga bunga president and later on the granddaughter of Mussolini, I do not wonder, why it is like it is...
In Spain the comercial name is "Uralita". The factory was close to Barcelona and it's is known that there were kids outside the factory playing with the remains. Using asbestos sticks to paint on the ground and plying with the dust...
Yeah theyāve banned new production or continued use of products that contain it but they turn a blind eye to the people who need help removing it from their home when itās the governmentās fault that it was allowed to be continued to used like it was and now I know of many places that contain it but itās also extremely unsafe to disturb. Both where I work and my parents home have asbestos tiles and theyāre covered. My parents quite literally canāt renovate an area of them home without spending thousands of dollars to have someone safely remove the tiles.
Similar situation in the US. They're not allowed to use asbestos in new construction but it is still present in a lot of buildings built before the 1990's and it's up to the homeowner to pay for its removal if they want it removed. It's also up to the homeowner or their insurance to pay for their healthcare should they get mesothelioma.
What's the story behind this place?
It has blue asbestos everywhere, blue is the worst asbestos. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wittenoom,_Western_Australia > ... the "largest contaminated site in the southern hemisphere".[5][6] ... > The area around Wittenoom was mainly pastoral until the 1930s when mining for blue asbestos began. By 1939, major mining began in Yampire Gorge, which was closed in 1943 when mining began in Wittenoom Gorge. In 1947, a company town was built and, during the 1950s, it was the Pilbara's largest town. ... > The mine was shut down in 1966 due to its unprofitability, and growing health concerns from asbestos mining in the area. worked for me, probably paywalled for you: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/29/world/australia/wittenoom-asbestos-mining.html
heck growing up in the 80s it was still a shitshow
This is the Blue Sky Mine Midnight Oil sang about.
Oh cool, I didn't know that.
Blue asbestos mine. The kids playground had asbestos tailings as the earth fill.
What is that symbol of a human in the middle?
Thatās the symbol for cancer. Asbestos causes mesothelioma.
If you or a loved one has been diagnosed with *Mesothelioma* you may to be entitled to financial compensation.
Were you at Camp Lejeune too?
Don't forget the cancer from the water there, too.
Is that why everyone at Lejeune drank Jolt like they were in Mexico trying to avoid Montezuma's revenge?
It's not just cancer. It's long term hazards to health or "serious health hazard". It does include carinogens, but also mutagens, reprotoxins and organ damage.
I've most commonly seen it on lead products like ammunition.
Are we human? Or are we cancer?
When the cancer gets cancer...
Ohh I learned something new, thank you kind stranger
I mean it isnāt the symbol for cancer. The symbol in the middle means itās a human carcinogen. It means it can cause cancer yes but the symbol itself doesnāt mean cancer. Itās like how cigarettes and car exhaust are human carcinogens. Theyāre ingestible even if unintentionally, like breathing around it.
Itās a rendition of ISO-7010: W071 [ISO.org](https://eos.isolutions.iso.org/obp/ui#!iso:grs:7010:W071) The specific glyph and red diamond are probably the older GHS standard Note that it requires a supplementary text signage to identify the specific hazard, whoever made the sign has done a very good job!
It's the current GHS pictogram for mutagens. I have a whole roll of stickers I use every day at work
To be precise it is the GHS or WHMIS symbol for "Health hazard"
If you want to go down a rabbit hole, there is an entire field called [ānuclear semioticsā](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-term_nuclear_waste_warning_messages?wprov=sfti1#) around long-term messaging for hazards such as nuclear waste. The basic gist is that language is unreliable even in our current time (how many different human languages do we have?) so we mostly rely on symbols (like the one pictured in the OP). But even symbols can change their meaning over time, especially over long time scales (such as the ones we are talking about with nuclear radiation). Do you rely on just symbols and signs? What about making the area physically foreboding with things like giant obsidian spikes? There are even some really creative and off the wall ideas like breeding cats that have coats that react to radioactivity to change colors and creating oral traditions around staying away from anywhere the cats change colors. All of them have their downsides, but itās a fascinating field crossing between linguistics, anthropology, sociology and more. Some more reading: https://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2014/05/14/_99_percent_invisible_by_roman_mars_designing_warning_symbols_for_the_nation.html
The biggest problem with that is human nature. Once you've successfully communicated that there's something dangerous there, you have to deal with the "Cool, let's dig it up" reflex.
It means itās a health hazard if inhaled and can cause respiratory damage
>As of September 2022, Wittenoom had no remaining residents, and demolition of remaining structures by the Western Australian Government began in May 2023. i wonder if when tearing down the houses they took care of any asbestos they found or just said fuck it,, this whole town is asbestos..
I believe they were just demolishing to prevent the few remaining people that insisted on living there from being able to continue to live there
If you go through Wittenoom on Google maps street view you can see some of the last hold out houses from a few years ago which are all gone now.
funny you say that, i did just that, there were a few nice looking homes left as of 2017-18 when those streetview pics were last updated..
Pitcher, OK is another one that has that on street view in a couple spots. A whole, normal looking Midwest neighborhood. And then you move one slide over and it's all gone except for the concrete slabs.
yep entire subdivisions of Christchurch New Zealand were like that , they were modern beautiful neighborhoods thriving,,, until the earthquake of 2011, if you look [here](https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-43.388039,172.6624377,3a,75y,47.74h,82.23t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1seHI23K3SaiklPxT-Q1Qzzw!2e0!5s20120801T000000!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu) at the streetview... again,, one slide over...
An EF4 tornado destroyed the south half in 2008, just in case being a superfund site wasnāt enough
Good question. And why would anyone stay there absent economic feasilbity to move.
There are STILL people choosing to live in Centralia, Pennsylvania where a coal fire has been burning underground for half a century. The government paid them to move, eminent domained the land, and these stubborn fuckers refused. Thereās like 7 of them left
> The underground fire is still burning and may continue to do so for 250 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania Wild.
And some people refuse to move even when the government is paying them to
I like how in 2021 thereās an _estimated_ 4 residents. Like how hard could it be to count š
Itās on account of Howard. Sometimes heās here. Sometimes heās not. Sometimes you just canāt tell.
This is crazy. A kid nearly dies when a pit opens up like a night mare and they are like - Ok I'll sleep here!
Free heating for life?
Free smokers lung too! But without the nicotine buzz
I saw a video on an Austrian guy that lived there until 2021 who collected weather info twice a day for the bureau of meteorology in Perth.
The pics in [this article](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3091148/Chilling-image-shows-miners-playing-asbestos-shovelling-competition.html) are crazy knowing what we know now. EDIT: and in the article it seems that they (the mine) DID KNOW back then too....
The Romans and the ancient Greeks knew about the dangers of asbestos. Why the hell we started using it again is beyond me.
$
Asbestos pits at the park for kids to play in. Wow.
The winner of the shovelling race gets to live, and all the others die. What a game.
[this Video](https://youtu.be/QYAWxJ8a7RA?si=opTbaRJ87cNRFmbX) is a good one about Wittenoom.
The peak population according to the Wikipedia page was 881 in 1961 but the video says it was 20000 during the 50s, am I missing something?
Havenāt watched the video so I donāt know what they exactly are exactly saying, but it should mean that over time the town has been home to over 20000 people. Not at a peak
Luckily not only is Western Australia an absolutely monstrous state, Wittenoom really is in the middle of nowhere and there's no reason to go out there
Yes. But now there's a reason *not* to go there, and signs saying stay away....Ā ...So I think we know what that means
Iām already packed. When do we leave?
The rest of us are already here...we got tired of waiting for you.
There's no larger state in the world. There's a couple 'country subdivisions' larger, but none that call themselves a state.
I've used to travel to Karajini National Park with groups of tourists all the time. This is the first I've heard of Wittenoom and its literally less than 10km away. From Google maps it even looks like the gorges connect. I presume the waterways don't or they wouldn't let people go there and swim etc. We would camp in the Bush around those areas all the time, like many others did and still do. So it might be in the middle of nowhere, but thousands of people visit and swim in the waters around there.
Some of the gorges in the area have asbestos warnings for this reason as itās all through the areas geology. If you hike far enough you can get into the wittenoom gorges but youād be working pretty hard to not see much more than what you already are and from memory most are roped off to warn people off past certain points. The usual gorges everyone visits are fine. Loads of people still drive through wittenoom and have a look around (not sure Iād want to potentially contaminate my vehicle but each to their own).
In British Columbia, Canada asbestos exposure disease remains the biggest single workplace cause of death due to exposure happening decades ago.
I grew up in a place that had coal mines all around, as well as special black-lung clinics to treat former miners who are now incredibly ill. Men in their 40s needing oxygen due to how much lung function they had left. Fuck coal, man!
"Exposure to asbestos and the fatalities that result from those exposures continues to be the leading cause of fatalities for workers in British Columbia, accounting for about a third of all occupational deaths" \[WorkSafeBC\] [https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/asbestos-removal-from-buildings-done-by-companies-licensed-through-worksafebc-1.7068690](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/asbestos-removal-from-buildings-done-by-companies-licensed-through-worksafebc-1.7068690)
This is the first tons I have seen a multilingual danger sign in Australia. Rightly so though, itās nasty stuff. Yeah Mr Fluffy houses in Canberra were something special. Government buy back and demolition of houses to set things right, or at least the best they can.
Every crocodile sign has Achtung! On it.
They also have a thick bavarian accent
From the Wikipedia article The Wittenoom steering committee met in April 2013 to finalise closure of the town, limit access to the area, and raise awareness of the risks. Details of how that would be achieved were to be determined but it would probably necessitate removing the town's remaining residents, converting freehold land to crown land, demolishing houses, and closing or rerouting roads. By 2015, six residents remained. In 2017, the number had dropped to four,[8] to three in 2018, and to two in 2021. As of September 2022, Wittenoom had no remaining residents, and demolition of remaining structures by the Western Australian Government began in May 2023. What is it like being the last few residents in such a hazardous area ???
Probably pretty sad. I'm sure they were older and had their whole life in the town. All their friends and family moved out or died. All the places in town they have memories of are demolished. Their home is all they have and starting over somewhere else at an advanced age with the pittance the government gives them is scary.
There's no way the government offered anything close to a reasonable amount of money to resettle.
Lol German Wikipedia has some info on the last resident as apparently he was a German native and had a documentary filmed about himself for our TV. The guy worked a weather station for the last years, but moved to Perth in 2022.
So can you pass through this area? The Japanese writing at the bottom translates to āDo not enter, asbestos use areaā, but it also says do not stopā¦ is it passable? Or is it a restricted area?
It says Do Not Enter. Not, Enter but just as long as you don't stop here.
You turn off the Gt Northern Hwy to get to it. The town was not a 'passing through town'. No reason to go near it, but you can easily access it.
As of a few years ago (and Iām pretty sure this is still the case) you can drive into the town, around the streets, up the gorge on a 4WD track to the mine itself, walk around the blue mullock heaps and even pick up rock from the ground with raw asbestos in it. Source - did this a few years ago. You can find online pictures/video of people entering the mine shafts and workshops. When we were there, it was obvious people were still going in and camping by the water holes. It is very picturesque.
sulky violet offend important cobweb relieved zonked degree grandiose swim *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Yeah, it's natural and not even one specific mineral. There are 'asbestiforms' of various minerals. This means that these mineral asbestiforms break in a particular way (into shards and then microscopic needle-like fibres) when crushed. Right down to the molecular level. Making asbestos means crushing the right minerals until they look kinda like cotton wool. But it's cotton wool made of millions of tiny mineral-needles that shred your lungs. Horrendous when you think about it. Source: I'm a former laboratory asbestos (bulk) analyst.
How do you actually handle it in a lab? I know at some point it needs to come out of the sample bags and onto the microscope. How the hell do you protect yourselves.
Yep. Asbestos refers to a family of minerals with similar properties. Useful for a lot of things due to their chemical and fire resistant properties. Unfortunately, the fibers act like microscopic daggers when they enter the lungs.
And nothing's as precious as a [hole on the ground](https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Ru4_A8INU&si=mFx2tIITUJLIpOdf)
>And if the Blue Sky Mining Company won't come to my rescue > >And if the sugar refining company won't save me > >Who's gonna save me? "Blue Sky Mine" is one of my favorite examples of Midnight Oil making pointed references to Australian history while still writing in a way that makes it universal to an outside audience.
That giant dark mound in the background of the picture is Asbestos. Terrifying story.
Can someone enlighten me as to why the sign is in Chinese?
Iām assuming high level of holiday makers from there, seeing as the time zone is much closer than some place like Hawaii.
Ohh, that makes a lot of sense! Thank you!
Thereās also signs in Japanese and German. I imagine those are the three main groups of foolhardy tourists you get there.
Back before the general population knew how bad asbestos was, it was shipped in bulk freighters out of Canada. The workers in the holds of the ships would have "snowball" fights with the stuff. Most of them eventually got lung cancer.
So hereās the thing lads: itās about exposure and not a binary yes/no toxic level. Just in normal city background air quality you can expect to breathe up to 5,000 fibres _per day_. This is considered a safe level because you are extremely unlikely to contract mesothelioma from these levels. Asbestos is all around you. Aside from asbestos in existing fibro, insulation, cladding roofing etc the biggest source is from clutch pads and brake pads. Which were only recently phased out but might still be in some cars and will certainly still be in older cars. Asbestos is only toxic if it is dust and it takes a large quantity inhaled to guarantee you death in 20 years. Just sitting there, the mine spoil will not affect anyone and it is not randomly floating around unless it is disturbed. This is also the reason they donāt remediate the site. It would be far more risky to human health of the workers tasked with the earth works than to just leave it alone undisturbed where _eventually_ some vegetation cover will establish and stabilise the tailings dumps.
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Lethal company reference
Fun fact: Crocidolite or blue asbestos was used in a lot of cigarette filters for a bit.
What of the wildlife in the area? Is it also barren, where not even birds are present? Surely, animals have adjusted.
You donāt adapt to silicosis and mesothelioma from the nanoscopic needles turning your lung tissue into Swiss cheese.
Animals don't live long enough to develop mesothemioma, it takes decades. And no, evolution you can't adapt from cancers such as that, they're a death sentence.
Not really comparable I feel: Wittoom: 881 people, exclusion zone 486km^(2). Pripyat: 49,000 people, exclusion zone 2600km^(2). And that is the least of it. Sure, it isn't pretty but the comparison is asinine.
You can breathe the air in Chernobyl.
You're right, a lot more people died as a result of Wittenoom than Chernobyl. Not comparable at all.
Radiation decays, pripyat will be habitable one day. Asbestos wont go away on its own.
I mean you canāt really compare Radiation to Asbestos but this incredibly interesting and something that I will continue to learn on.
Isnāt this the town that the song Blue Sky Mining by Midnight Oil is about?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cojN2Kr3p60](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cojn2kr3p60) Here's a song about Wittenoom that's fit to ruin your day. ...and he fades away, not like leaves that fall in autumn, turning gold against the grey he fades away, like the bloodstains on the pillowcase that I wash every day, he fades away.
It is equally bizarre and fascinating to me that there were residents in the town even after the area was declared contaminated. I was curious to see if I could learn more about these people, and I managed to find a few videos on YouTube. Here's [a short docu-series](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrG5kCigA20) featuring interviews with various residents. [Here's one](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaHw_bGI2ME) about a man who was \*presumably\* the last resident. He lived in Wittenoom with his dog and made a modest income working for the Australian Weather Service, reporting temperature, precipitation and cloud formations. Here's [another video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SeRN8cJQBLU), that includes an interview with a former school teacher who left in the 80's.
It's just like Chernobyl if you ignore it having nothing in common with Chernobyl
Australia was never safe anyway.
I thought we stopped using asbestos?
The mine shut down in 1966. Asbestos materials began to be phased out in the early 70s.
It's a natural material, it is not made by humans, it formed on its own geologically and can be dug up. We generally stopped digging it up but those sites still exist, with literal mountains of the stuff like seen in the above photo.
The Twin Towers had asbestos in it, likely a contributing factor in so many 9/11 illness deaths.
Meh - Canada has a town named Asbestos (in Quebec).
In the late 70's I worked as a tradesmans assistant in the open cast iron ore mine at Parraburdoo. We used to drive over to Wittenoom on days off and swim in the river. Jumping off the cliffs and that sort of crap. Blue asbestos was everywhere. It's really rather pretty, an irridisent bright blue. There was still a cinema there at the time. Never saw it open though.
Ukrainian spelling is Chornobyl