Posted by Ahyehokay on 12/20/09

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Is there anyone on this board that went into the
fiberglass industry,from 1960's,or 1970's,or even before
or after and experiance any exposures? Did you see any
inspections? Were you provided with MSDS material,or any
type of education on, or about,(the older toxic chemicals,
you were using,on a daily,weekly,even yearly basis? Did
you go to ("boat college?") to learn to build boats?Do you
remember any inspections? Did you ever work in a "sick
building" syndrome? Did you ever find a co-worker dead?Did
you have regular meetings to be updated on new glues and
other new hazardous chemicals brand new, right off the
market,and evidentally putting them out there for
uneducated people to try them out. Maybe, in the future,
we will be able to tell you if there is any long term
effects on us ginnypiggs ,later after we might not like
the way it works, or they sneak it out yesturday, and
replace it, after 2 deaths in one day. It took someones
life to figure out how toxic it was. It sounds like a bunch
of unexperianced, uneducated, regular old boat builders to
me and thats exactly what it was and what was going on!!!
Chemicals,chemicals that were there yesturday,but were
called back all of a sudden? Did you work in Wash. st.
where you only have to be 18 or older,with no prior
experiance, working with Toxic Chemicals, that have caused
deaths in the workplace,much-less experiance building
boats.The only way you can make 50 cents more an hr.is to
have some experiance, working with fiberglass.(It says
nothing about these chemicals)For example:Your at a young
age,you enjoy your job,you get offered more money,as the
years go by & your reputation blossoms as word gets a-
round about what you can do,and with almost 20 years of
fiberglass work on your record, here comes some other boat
builder, offering you more than you've ever made. And, as
boat people do, they go for it. It was a competition type
job,where even woman could make more than a man.That was a
rare finding,and if you had any college education, you
would be too qualified to build boats. You go along,with
weird sypmtoms and different diagnosis,here and there,and
these pains,that come and go,like you've never experianced
all these many changes,and its like your body is telling
you it can't keep this up anymore, Your hands curl up in a
ball. You run real warm water over them,to get them to
open backup,your hearing, your ears start having loud and
scary rings,feel plugged at times,even for weeks,maybe a
month,you never know.Then, your eyes ere diagnosed with
glaucoma,and its not the hereditary kind, one eye has more
damage in it on your next eye appt.,only to find out you
have had a stroke in it, within the last 6 months.Then,
you need a surgery on a vital organ thats being targeted
at the time,and before the procedure,the Dr. checks your
vitals, only to find a very enlarged liver,which is one of
the first things toluene attacks, according to any MSDS
info.,cause toluene,glue,and most of the other toxic
chemicals,along with pro-longed exposures, will effect
your whole nervous system,which it has,attacks and re-
attacks until it has destroyed your immune system,causes
respitory problems, like asthma, and it gives you a type
of pneumonia,caused by industrial exposures from working
in "sick blding's, if your educated enough to know what it
means, there were many of them existing here in Wa. St. in
the 60's,70's,80's & probably the 90's, the way our govt.is
if it weren't for a bad economy, along with alot of
bussinesses closing down,maybe it was a blessing in
disguise,who knows. It only took me how many years and a
MRI, showing a brain injury, that I was not told about
until 4 years later, when they wanted to do another MRI to
compare with the one done 4 yrs. earlier. It was then,
after years of educating myself on exactly what my problem
was, I realized that all of those years of exposures had
been going on since my first job with fiberglass. I was
just too exposed (probably)most every day, having used the
same method with fiberglass and chemicals on a daily
basis,I'd bet everyone else in this company was and
probably are having some type of problems from those
exposures,now,and don't even have a clue or they are just
in a vege state, which can and has happened using
toluene, styrene for such a lenghthy time on some
exposures. I dont remember it all, but there were
documented deaths from a certain type of glue, recalled
aprox.late 70's,early 80's, used with toluene. there were
all kinds of sm fires, some done experimenting with
different chemicals,resins, laquer thinners,paints,
lighters thrown in tanks of acetone, only to retrieve it
later to see if it had a spark. It did and the guys beard
caught affire. There was alot of b.s.going on, and for
some reason people were getting away with very dangerous
games with these chemicals, for years back!!!
If my experiance and knowledge can help even one person,I
will feel like I gave something back that was taken from
us Wa, St.workers who worked in the fiberglass business
around toxic chemicals, without any training and probably
totally unaware of an exposure being present. If you dont
know what an exposure is, how would you know if you had
one, and what the long term effects would be, until you
have to live through the whole damn ordeal, and every Dr.
you went to, said it was not an exposure, were most-likely
not educated enough in that area, didn't know,didn't care,
and he surely couldn't let you, the person suffering with
the horrible illness, maybe be a little more educated from
his knowledge and years of working with the
itchy,scratchy,nasty stuff, and he might know what hes
talking about-no! If this e mail seems different, it's
because I have had a traumatic brain injury, which, in
many ways like having alzheimers, if your familiar with
that. NOT A PRETTY PICTURE, believe me.

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