Paul Resch remembers playing baseball as a baby on a field made from asbestos-contaminated vermiculite just just a few meters away railway tracks where trains kicked up clouds of dust as they transported contaminated material from a mountain mine through the northwest Montana town of Libby. During long days spent on the tracks along the Kootenai River, he liked to sneak into vermiculite-filled storage bins at an adjoining rail yard to catch pigeons he desired to feed.
Today the 61-year-old Resch is fighting an asbestos-related disease This left his left lung severely scarred. He is well out of breath, tires easily, and knows there isn’t any cure for an illness that would suffocate him over time.
“Everyone has probably come into contact with it at some point,” he said, referring to asbestos-contaminated vermiculite. “There were piles of them along the railroad tracks. … Clouds of dust would blow through the city center.”
Nearly 25 years after federal authorities responded to news reports of deaths and illnesses in Libby, a town of about 3,000 people near the U.S.-Canada border, some asbestos victims and their relations are in search of to publicly hold certainly one of the biggest corporations on this planet accountable Tragedy: BNSF Railway.
Hundreds of individuals died More than 3,000 people within the Libby area have turn out to be in poor health from asbestos exposure, in line with researchers and health officials. Texas-based BNSF is accused of negligence and wrongful death for failing to regulate contaminated dust clouds that previously swirled from the rail yard and settled over Libby’s neighborhood.
The vermiculite was shipped by rail from Libby to be used as insulation in homes and businesses throughout the United States
The first trial in what lawyers say are a whole bunch of lawsuits against BNSF over its alleged role in polluting the Libby community is scheduled to start Monday.
The railroad — owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. — has denied responsibility in court filings and declined further comment.
Resch works at a automotive dealership in Libby and his wife is listed as a plaintiff in a pending lawsuit against BNSF in Montana asbestos court. He is not sure if his illness stems from the rail yard. The tracks at Libby High School contained contaminated vermiculite, as did the insulation within the partitions and attics of the homes he entered during his 20 years as a volunteer firefighter.
The plaintiffs within the upcoming trial against BNSF, the estates of Joyce Walder and Thomas Wells, lived near the Libby train station and moved away many years ago. Both died in 2020 from mesothelioma, a rare lung cancer brought on by asbestos that’s disproportionately common in Libby.
The mine, just a few miles outside of town, once produced as much as 80% of the world’s vermiculite supplies. It was closed in 1990. Nine years later, the Environmental Protection Agency arrived in Libby and a subsequent cleanup effort is estimated to have cost $600 million, most of which was covered by taxpayer money. It’s still ongoing, but authorities say levels of asbestos in downtown Libby’s air are 100,000 times lower than when the mine was in operation.
Awareness of the hazards of asbestos has increased significantly lately, and within the last month there was a major increase in awareness of the hazards of asbestos EPA banned the last remaining industrial use of asbestos within the United States
The ban didn’t address the style of asbestos fibers present in Libby, nor did it address so-called “legacy” asbestos already in homes, schools and businesses. A protracted-awaited government evaluation of the remaining risks is due by December 1st.
Asbestos doesn’t burn and is immune to corrosion, so it has an extended shelf life within the environment. People who inhale the needle-like fibers can develop health problems for as much as 40 years after exposure. Health officials expect they are going to need to take care of newly diagnosed cases of asbestos disease for many years.
The EPA declared the nation’s first public health emergency in 2009 as a part of the Superfund cleanup program in Libby. The pollution led to civil lawsuits from hundreds of people that worked for the mine or the railroad or lived within the Libby area.
During a year-long cleanup of Libby Station that began in 2003, employees excavated nearly the complete station and removed about 18,000 tons of contaminated soil. In 2020, BNSF signed a consent decree with federal authorities regulating cleanup efforts in Libby and nearby Troy, in addition to a 42-mile (68-kilometer) stretch of railroad.
Last 12 months, BNSF won a federal lawsuit against an asbestos treatment clinic in Libby, where a jury concluded 337 lawsuits had been filed False claims about asbestos, making patients eligible for Medicare and other advantages. The judge overseeing the case ordered the Center for Asbestos Related Disease to pay nearly $6 million Penalties and Damagesthereby forcing the ability bankruptcy. Operations will proceed with reduced staff.
Some asbestos victims viewed the case as a ploy to discredit the clinic and undermine lawsuits against the railroad. BNSF said the ruling would “deter future misconduct” by the clinic.
In the months leading as much as this week’s trial, BNSF lawyers repeatedly tried to shift blame for the illness, including by pointing to the actions of WR Grace and Co., which owned the mine from 1963 until its closure . They also questioned whether other sources of asbestos could have caused the 2 plaintiffs’ illnesses and suspected that Walder and Wells were trespassing on the railroad’s property.
U.S. District Court Judge Brian Morris blocked BNSF from blaming others’ conduct as a method of escaping liability. And he said the law doesn’t support the concept trespassing diminishes a property owner’s duty to not cause harm.
Morris has not yet made a final ruling on one other essential issue: the railroad’s claim that its obligation to ship goods for paying customers exempts it from liability.
The plaintiffs argue that the downtown Libby rail yard — where Resch once played with piles of vermiculite — was used for storage, not only transportation, meaning the railroad shouldn’t be exempt.
The Montana Supreme Court has ruled in a separate case that BNSF and its predecessors had more involvement within the mine than simply supplying its products.
Mine owner WR Grace filed for bankruptcy in 2001 and paid $1.8 billion into an asbestos trust fund to settle future cases. It was about value it 270 million dollars to government agencies for environmental damage and cleanup work. Libby also accused the state of Montana of failing to warn residents about asbestos exposure. It paid settlements totaling $68 million to about 2,000 plaintiffs.
BNSF has settled some previous lawsuits over undisclosed amounts, plaintiffs’ lawyers said. A second trial against the railroad over the death of a Libby resident is scheduled for May in federal court in Missoula.
“I really hope that they get justice for these people,” Resch said of the upcoming trials. “I mean, as far as corporate America is concerned, everyone participated.”
Hanson reported from Helena, Montana.
