Peter M. Cooke, founder of Microscopy Instruction, Consultation & Analysis, talks to industrial hygienists at U.S. Naval Hospital Okinawa on Aug. 30. Cook was brought to Okinawa for a week to teach the hygienists — from Yokosuka, Sasebo and Okinawa — how to properly align and calibrate microscopes, as well as identify asbestos and quantify the amount in samples. His course is titled “Asbestos Identification Using Polarized Light Microscopy.” (Fred Zimmerman / S&S)
CAMP LESTER, Okinawa — The U.S. Naval Hospital here hosted a week of training for industrial hygienists, giving them an opportunity to learn more about asbestos, a once commonly used fireproofing material later found to be a cancer-causing agent.
Many construction and renovation projects in buildings and on ships require safe removal of asbestos.
The course was to teach the personnel from Okinawa and Navy bases at Sasebo and Yokosuka how to set up microscopy equipment properly and to identify the material.
Cmdr. Stan Jossell, the hospital’s Community Health director, said the 10 industrial hygienists also were trained in criteria to determine if building materials contain asbestos.
“The permissible exposure limit is low … that’s why we have labs to determine if samples have asbestos,” Jossell said.
The most dangerous type of asbestos is the “friable” kind, in which particles can become airborne, according to Christine L. Nomura, a certified industrial hygienist at the hospital.
Examples of non-friable asbestos, she said, are floor tiles and the adhesive used to hold the tiles down — substances unlikely to be released into the air.
“The most hazardous asbestos is at the top of the list for abatement,” Nomura said.
“But most of the hazardous asbestos is already gone.”
She said an asbestos abatement project currently is under way at the hospital.
Some asbestos is in ceiling areas where new heating, ventilation and air conditioning ducts are being placed.
The training, Jossell said, “means the hospital now has first-hand knowledge, a jump start in terms of getting the training specific to the new Navy standards. We will now have resident- trained asbestos analyzers that can now support other bases.”
Navy Lt. Keith W. Kilpatrick, another industrial hygienist attending the training, is about to be assigned to the USS Theodore Roosevelt, where he will be the resident asbestos expert.
When ships undergo repairs in foreign ports, asbestos may be in the materials and tests should be run.
“If I don’t know how to identify asbestos,” Kilpatrick said, “I may not be able to safely identify it for abatement.”
