Word: silica
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...subsidiary of Union Carbide & Carbon Corp. Last week Rinehart & Dennis were putting in last licks on their tunnel. But many a man who began the digging in 1929 was not alive to see the finish in 1936. Some had died of silicosis, incurable lung disease caused by inhaling silica dust. Pneumonia and tuberculosis had caused the deaths of others who may or may not have been suffering with silicotic irritation...
Gaunt Philippa Allen, social worker, testified: "Dry drilling was the cause of the dense silica dust. It would stop when State mine inspectors entered the tunnel. Men acted as lookouts to warn of their presence. As a result inspectors testified that the tunnel was practically dust free. Mrs. Charlie Jones of Gamoca was the .first to find what was killing the men." Mrs. Jones, according to Miss Allen, begged money along the road to pay for x-rays of the lungs of her son Shirley who asked on his deathbed to "be opened up to see if I didn...
Silicosis is due to inhalation of fine, sharp particles of sand, sandstone or quartz, all of which contain silica, by miners', sandblasters, quarrymen, tunnel borers. The silica particles erode the delicate lining of the lungs, make them vulnerable to the germs of pneumonia and tuberculosis. If those diseases do not kill, the silica victim usually wastes away to death because his clogged lungs transmit insufficient oxygen to his blood...
Because silicosis may terminate fatally as long as 40 years after silica inhalations, the California Supreme Court last year declared that there is no time limit to bar a silicotic employe from bringing a damage suit against an employer. Industrial insurance companies immediately wanted to increase their rates. Operators of deep California gold mines, which are difficult to ventilate, would be obliged to pay $22.25 instead of the current $11 premium for every $100 they pay their men. Some mines of low-profit margin have already shut down. Others threaten to do so. Mineowners and miners, who face loss...
...waterpower tunnel was begun at Gauley Bridge along the forest-fringed New River in southern West Virginia, with cheap transient labor, black and white, from mountain districts as far away as Georgia. The tunnel went through white sandstone and quartz which were 99% pure silica. Every blast of dynamite puffed deadly silica dust down the throats of sappers who wore no protective masks over their mouths & noses. Rapidly men began to die of silicosis, pneumonia and tuberculosis. When workmen refused to go into the tunnel heads, foremen, according to subsequent court testimony, often clubbed them on. But the foremen dutifully...