The house is full of asbestos, what to do?

[raddforasbest]

Hello.

The anxiety is here!

Yesterday I had a massive panic attack when I noticed the kitchen was being demolished, the house is from 68, townhouse model. So several houses that are exactly alike.

http://postimg.org/image/feroz6pov/

I've never had such a direct panic attack as I did when I went into the kitchen and saw this. I immediately ran out and slept at a friend's place last night. NOW the situation is that I will have access to an apartment on September 1st, as you can see it's quite a while until then.

The plan now is to move into a 9sqm cabin which is about 10 meters away from the asbestos dwelling.

Thanks for your responses (a benzo-ed asbestos neurotic.)

Edit: Is it safe to go into the house itself for maybe 5 minutes to grab the most necessary things?

 

[tacho]

Did you suddenly notice that someone was tearing in your kitchen? Or did I miss something?

First, maybe you should find out if it's even asbestos. What indication do you have that it would be? Have neighbors renovated kitchens before? Then they should know if asbestos materials were used in the construction of the kitchens.

Is it a condominium townhouse? If so, check with the board.

If you really have evidence that it's asbestos and feel a strong discomfort about it, you should get a face mask with a P3 filter and retrieve the things you need.

 

[Micro]

You don't need to be paranoid, believe that your medications are more harmful to your health than any asbestos could cause you upon exposure. Relax, take a couple of deep breaths and go in calmly to retrieve the things you want.

 

[raddforasbest]

Two different answers here.

By the way, I called the asbestos hotline and he said it's COMPLETELY fine to live in the house... While he was absolutely sure it was asbestos. Yeah right..

I live with my parents, they are the ones who decide what happens, and I knew the kitchen would be tiled, but I didn't know they would remove the cardboard panels and start tearing down what was underneath, tiles I didn't even know existed!!

 

[mycke_nu]

Why would it be asbestos?

 

[raddforasbest]

No idea. However, it was frequently used in tiles and grout in the 50s, 60s, and 70s!

Blackness between tiles often indicates asbestos.

 

[mycke_nu]

And the company doing the demolition uses protective suits and respirators?

 

[Mikael_L]

Take it easy. Even if it happens to be asbestos, it is totally harmless to be in the house for half an hour after they've been working on it and all. As soon as the dust has settled.

Moreover, it is actually 99.9% harmless to be in the house while it's being demolished too, as the risk of asbestos-related injuries has mainly affected people who have worked without respirators 5 days a week for their entire lives. But despite that, I personally wouldn't work even a day demolishing asbestos without wearing a respirator, as there's too little reason to expose oneself to even an almost non-existent risk when a cheap respirator is all that's needed to minimize the risk to an additional 1/100 or 1/1000 of the already almost non-existent risk.

But if you stay outside the house while work and cleaning possible asbestos dust, you're safe.

edit:
By the way, the panel behind a plasterboard, black mold spores are the most dangerous thing that can be there (such spores are found everywhere in nature, by the way).

 

[raddforasbest]

Please don't be naive.. The guy who tore it down was a foreigner and even though there was talk about invoices, I hardly think this guy even knows what asbestos means.

 

[raddforasbest]

The demolition has taken place. I'm not sure if you can really talk about cleaning. It's not like my parents are now using asbestos vacuums afterward.

From what I've read online (and yes, I've read A LOT about asbestos), these fibers linger in the air for months after demolition. My parents don't understand my concern, but there are people for everything.

 

[mycke_nu]

40 years ago, I helped install an asbestos roof.

The tiles were cut with an angle grinder, and everything was enveloped in a huge dust cloud. Still healthy as a nut, as far as I know.

Worrying about a few tile joints is just silly.

Take it easy.

 

[Stefan N]

I can promise you won't find a trace of asbestos there, you need to sort through what you read on the internet because not everything is true.
White tile adhesive on gypsum and regular brown tile grout from the 70s are not signs of asbestos at all.

 

[ivarssonivar]

Considering how reluctant raddforasbest was to listen to anyone in his other thread "Is this an asbestos roof?" I don't think he will listen to anyone in this thread either.

Is this an asbestos roof?:
http://www.byggahus.se/forum/tak-vind/215002-ar-detta-ett-asbesttak.html

 

[Matti_75]

Take it easy. Even if it happens to be asbestos, it's totally harmless to be in the house half an hour after they've torn it down and so on. As soon as the dust has settled.

And furthermore, it's actually 99.9% harmless to be in the house while it's being torn down too, as the risk of asbestos damage has mostly affected people who worked without respiratory protection 5 days a week their entire lives.

But despite that, I myself wouldn't work even a day tearing down asbestos without wearing a respirator, as there's too little reason to expose oneself even to an almost negligible risk when a cheap respirator is all that's needed to minimize the risk to another 1/100 or 1/1000 of the already almost negligible risk.

But if you stay outside the house while it's being worked on and cleaned of potential asbestos dust, then you're safe.

edit: Furthermore, the board behind a plasterboard, black mold spores are the most dangerous thing that can be there (such can be found everywhere in nature, by the way).

Mikael_L I think you need to read up a bit about asbestos before giving advice. It takes a bit longer for the asbestos fibers to settle than half an hour. I'm not saying you should be afraid of asbestos, but you should have respect for it and not trivialize the whole thing.

 

[Fred vom Jupiter]

Wondering if it's Stina71 who got a new account on Bygga hus? She started lots of threads about asbestos for every detail of her house and ignored the replies that said it was risk-free.