Fun with Carcinogens

Well, tonight's work came to a sudden, screeching halt. Why?

It looked like the floor tiles in the Accordion Room were both put down in the 1980's, but when I started scraping the top layer off it became clear that the bottom layer was much, much older. 95% of old floor tiles/the glue used for attaching those tiles contain asbestos, and scraping them up can loosen the material. I'll play fast and loose with lead all day long but asbestos is not fun, so we're sending a sample off to a lab to be tested.

Our first, stupid thought was to try to find a lab that would be open on a Saturday, but it's not as if there's a huge amount of walk-in testing business. Eventually a yellow pages search revealed HMA Asbestos and Lead Sampling over in San Leandro, who will accept mailed in samples, so a chunk of floor tile is heading over there in the mail tomorrow.

And in the meantime we will work on other projects and keep our fingers crossed. Asbestos removal is not impossible or even particularly dangerous, but it is a huge pain in the butt.

Technorati Tags: flooring, asbestos

posted by ayse on 03/21/08