ASBEST, Russia — Every weekday afternoon miners set explosions in a strip mine owned by the Russian mining company Uralasbest. The blasts send huge plumes of asbestos fiber and dust into the air. Asbest is one of the more extreme examples of the environmental costs of modern Russia’s deep reliance on mining....
It's the Russian version of fracking -- something strangely missing from my Sunday Globe today(?).
Of the half-dozen people interviewed who worked at the factory or mine, all had a persistent cough, a symptom of exposure to what the residents call “the white needles.”
Residents also describe skin ailments. Doctors interviewed at a dermatology ward in town say the welts arise from inflammation caused by asbestos.
The International Agency for Research on Cancer, which is a branch of the World Health Organization, is in the midst of a multiyear study of asbestos workers in Asbest. It said no additional research was needed to determine that the dust is harmful....
Standing on the rim of the world’s largest open pit asbestos mine provides a panoramic scene. It is about half the size of the island of Manhattan and the source of untold tons of asbestos. The pit descends about 1,000 feet down slopes created by terraced access roads. Big mining trucks haul out fibrous, gray, raw asbestos....
So entwined is the life of the town with this pit that the class-action lawsuits that demolished asbestos companies in the United States are not possible in Russia’s weak judicial system, which favors powerful producers. Russia, which has the world’s largest geological reserves of asbestos, mines about 850,000 tons of asbestos a year and exports about 60 percent of it. Demand is still strong for asbestos in China and India.
Just wondering why the Globe's website didn't mine this from my printed paper:
"The Russian Chrysotile Association, an asbestos industry trade group, reports that business is growing, mostly because other countries are getting out of the business. The mine and the factory Uralasbest owns are the principal employers. The town depends on the jobs that mining asbestos and making asbestos products bring. Nationwide, the industry employs 38,500 Russians directly while about 400,000 people depend on the factories and mines for their livelihood, if supporting businesses in the mining towns are counted."
Sound familiar, Americans? A lot more to mine in there, too!
They did get this at the bottom of the pan:
Valentin K. Zemskov, 82, worked at the mine for 40 years and developed asbestosis, a respiratory illness caused by breathing in asbestos fibers, which scar lung tissue. “There was so much dust you couldn’t see a man standing next to you,” he said of his working years. For the disability, the factory adds about $135, to his monthly retirement check, which would be enough to cover only a few restaurant meals.
Still, he said the city had no other choice. “If we didn’t have the factory, how would we live?” he said, gasping for air as he talked. “We need to keep it open so we have jobs.”
What a devil's choice (as I am reminded of the 9/11 heroes that dug through the rubble down there).
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I guess that will make the mansions worthless.
"Russians to leave post in Arctic as floe melts" by Will Englund | Washington Post, June 02, 2013
MOSCOW — Russia is preparing to evacuate a drifting Arctic research station that was supposed to last until September because the ice it is built on is starting to break up.
The cracks are another indication of the rapid decline of the Arctic ice sheet — especially so because the encampment is on the Canadian side of the Arctic Sea, where the ice is oldest and most durable.
Related:
Large Increase In Arctic Ice This Summer
Unprecedented Arctic Cold Continues
Hey, look, don't let that get in the way of the agenda-pu$hing paper and it's narrative.
‘‘It’s a huge loss for us, and for science,’’ Vladimir Sokolov, director of the expedition, said in a phone interview from St. Petersburg, Russia. ‘‘For us, it is very important to get information about the climate system in the high-latitude Arctic.’’
Sending an ice-breaker(?) for them.
Related: Slow Saturday Special: Swedish Snapshot
But don't make a big deal out of it, okay?
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Russian President Vladimir Putin made May 21 Polar Researchers Day, to honor the St. Petersburg institute. He also called on Russia’s United Shipbuilding Corporation to provide the icebreakers, drilling rigs, and extraction platforms that Russia needs for more efficient exploitation of Arctic resources.
Why would they need icebrea.... kers.... if.... aaahhhh, never mind! Must be the asbestos.
Climate change has been linked by many scientists to the release of carbon into the atmosphere by the burning of fossil fuels, but Putin said the melting ice sheet gives Russia an opportunity, opening shipping lanes and access for drilling.
At a meeting of the Arctic Council in Sweden, Russia, the United States, and other nations recognized the potential threat posed by climate change to the Arctic environment, but did not pursue the issue.
Neither will I then.
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Related:
"Pay no attention to the record setting winters we have suffered through the last few years; the world is really getting warmer, but the heat it ... the heat is .... the heat is ... hiding! Yeah, yeah. Sure, sure! Hiding. Hiding in the deep ocean!" That's a neat trick, considering that warm water RISES and should be at the surface. The fact is that none of the dire warnings the carbonazis made ten years ago have happened. We still have snow (even more of it, as those parts of Europe and the Americas dealing with floods from that melted snow can attest). Greenland still has all of its ice. The polar bears did not drown, indeed they are so over-populated they are being hunted and killed. We are in the middle of the summer melt-season and so far this year, this is the coldest arctic summer on record. Needless to say, contrary to claims of a shrinking ice cap (see drowning polar bears) the arctic ice extent is at a record high. And finally, before we start screaming about warning oceans and human-caused carbon dioxide, here is a quick science question. How many active volcanoes are there on the floor of the world's oceans? Don't know? Don't feel bad; it's a trick question. Nobody knows! Nobody actually knows how many active volcanoes (and thermal vents) there are on the floor of the world's oceans, pouring intense heat from the Earth's interior into the ocean waters, warming the seas (and of course, cooling the Earth's core). And if nobody actually knows that particular fact, then any statements about warming of the Earth's oceans due to human activity are little more than a WAG (Scientific Wild-Assed Guess) for political gain, to extract carbon taxes and obedience from a gullible public. " -- WhatReallyHappened
Hey, you don't have to believe him, you don't have to believe me, you don't have to believe your own senses. If you want to believe in the goodness of our ma$ters on this, fine. I'm done with the fart mi$t.
Speaking of which:
"Gay activists jailed over illegal protest
MOSCOW — Russian police arrested gay rights activists and Russian nationalists who confronted them at a rally Saturday that was declared illegal under a new law. St. Petersburg officials said the rally, which occurred in a spot designated for protests, violated the law (AP)."
Once again, upon a Sunday.
