Path: utzoo!mnetor!tmsoft!mason
From: mason@tmsoft.uucp (Dave Mason)
Newsgroups: can.general
Subject: Re: Attikamek-Montagnais Protest PCB Plan
Message-ID: <1989Sep7.190126.8684@tmsoft.uucp>
Date: 7 Sep 89 19:01:26 GMT
References: <2324@yunccn.UUCP> <620791816.24086@telly.on.ca> <1989Sep5.173937.24977@utzoo.uucp> <8328@looking.on.ca> <28908@watmath.waterloo.edu> <1450@bnr-fos.UUCP>
Reply-To: mason@tmsoft.UUCP (Dave Mason)
Followup-To: can.general
Organization: TM Software Associates, Toronto
Lines: 30

In article <1450@bnr-fos.UUCP> tpc@bnr-fos.UUCP (Tom Chmara) writes:
>There was a GE transformer plant in Toronto (now closed) at which the
>workers WASHED UP with PCBs: they are excellent degreasers.

While from everything I can find, this was NOT a particularly UNSAFE
practice, please remember that just because someone in authority says
something is harmless does not make it so.

There was a story in Atlantic Insight magazine (a great magazine, by
the way, if you have any Atlantic Canada blood in your veins) a couple
of years ago which interviewed some people who had worked for New
Brunswick Power [in the 50's I sort-of remember] spraying defoliants
on electric power right-of-ways.  One worker (of the few still alive)
remembers that initially they had some concerns about the safety of
the chemical, but when one of the supervisors/engineers assured them
that it was "as safe as water" and demonstrated by downing a cupful of
the stuff their fears were assuaged to the point that to cool off
after a hot day's spraying they would often have "water" fights using
the high-power nozzles mounted on the trucks to blast each other with
defoliant (related to Agent Orange, needless to say, and containing
dioxins).  As I remember the article, the survivors of this job were
suing NB Power for endangering their health.

Sometimes I wonder/worry about the stuff in some of these wonder
chemicals I get all over my hands like WD40, Liquid Wrench, brake
fluid, etc.  (I have an old car I'm working on off-and-on, and
sometimes there's just no alternative to getting the chemicals on your
hands.  I'm usually fairly careful.)

	Alive and healthy so far...	../Dave