From: Monona Rossol <0000030664c37427-dmarc-request**At_Symbol_Here**LISTS.PRINCETON.EDU>
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Lead contamination [was: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...
Date: Fri, 2 Aug 2019 18:09:58 +0000
Reply-To: ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU>
Message-ID: 1807006476.344940.1564769398602**At_Symbol_Here**mail.yahoo.com
In-Reply-To


If OSHA citations of gun ranges for Lead Standard violations are of interest to you, you can go to www.osha.gov, get into the laws and regulations section and search for violations by industry, plug in gun ranges, and you should come up with a bunch.  I've written about some of these.  

This is a very well-known issue.  The people who work in these ranges in particular have high blood lead levels.  It is not just that the bullets create a fine lead dust when they hit things and that they  shed lead, the bullet primer is usually a lead compound such as lead peroxide or lead azide.  That smoke that they blow away from the old six shooter in the Westerns is high in lead fume content -- which explains the acting in my view.

Gun ranges are required under the Lead Standard to have special ventilation and hygiene procedures to control airborne lead and dust deposition.  They are required to have a written Lead Standard Program and if their air-monitoring find lead near or at the PEL, (which it usually does) they are supposed to be providing medical surveillance in the form of blood tests for the employees.  

If your little ranges don't have these precautions in place, they are definitely places you could damage your health and knock a few points off your I.Q.

In this case, it is not the guns, it is the bullets,that are dangerous..  And there are bullets that shoot non-lead alloys and are primed with lead-free pyro compounds. It not likely in the state where lead mining was done for so long would be using these.

Monona


-----Original Message-----
From: Jarral Ryter <jryter**At_Symbol_Here**WESTERN.EDU>
To: DCHAS-L <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU>
Sent: Fri, Aug 2, 2019 1:15 pm
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Lead contamination [was: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...

I've been watching this discussion and it brought up this concern/question..
We are in a rural area of colorado. Guns are very common and there are many "shooting ranges" on hillsides. These are just pull offs and have been used for years. There is one official club with indoor and outdoor ranges.. 
My analytical/instrumental classes started measuring lead a couple years ago in the dirt via ICP around these and under eves of old houses (and paint). As you might expect the shooting ranges have off the chart levels all around them. Many old houses have high-ish levels from paint flakes (we don't have large industrial pollution) . 

Paint is easily eaten and sweet. But i have been pondering how much lead transfers to children from this dust from dad/mom shooting and tracking dust home (and real americans take their kids shooting).
I've done blood lead tests in the past at another lab and don't want students touching this. Hair tests are feasible. I would also like to test dust in the indoor shooting area.
Question is then are shattered bullets easily absorbed form of lead. I'm guessing not really as bad as paint but not good for kids to be around.

And i don't want certain people to get upset that i'm saying guns are dangerous. ;)

Comments?

Jarral Ryter 
Western colorado university 
Gunnison CO

Sent from my Verizon, Samsung Galaxy smartphone


-------- Original message --------
From: James Kaufman <jim**At_Symbol_Here**LABSAFETY.ORG>
Date: 8/2/19 4:11 AM (GMT-06:00)
To: DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Lead contamination [was: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...

NOTICE: This email originated from outside of the University. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe. Thank you, Western IT Services.
I had a case where the child did it at about age 4.  ... Jim 

James A. Kaufman, Ph.D.
Founder, LSI
508-574-6264

On Thu, Aug 1, 2019, 5:01 PM Monona Rossol <0000030664c37427-dmarc-request**At_Symbol_Here**lists.princeton.edu> wrote:
I'm very familiar with Johnson Controls.  For the right to do the better-paying jobs, women were given the right to damage their fetuses. Very interesting trade off.  But things got better after the lawyers figured out that the damaged fetus, can at age 18, file suit against the employer.  The child is a 3rd party who never agreed to the exposure and did not provide informed consent to take a risk. 

As for the limits I referred to, unions can set their own rules through their collective bargaining agreements with the producers.  So SAG has rules about pregnant women, child performers and other high risk individuals. And they stick.  Think for a minute about the leverage SAG has.   If there is a limit in the collective bargaining agreement that is violated, the issue can go to grievance and hold up a production at a cost of millions per day.  And if the star is not comfortable about the conditions under which they are asked to perform they also can delay shooting.  And should there be an issue with a pregnancy or a child performer, the issue might also be tried in the press.  That can be very expensive in terms of public relations.  

We have a very different world here.  And I think workers might want to take a look at some of our strategies.  A few of them can be used in any industry.

Monona





-----Original Message-----
From: Harold Ingmire <hingmire**At_Symbol_Here**WHIPMIX.COM>
To: DCHAS-L <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU>
Sent: Thu, Aug 1, 2019 12:25 pm
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Lead contamination [was: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...

I would recommend caution in dealing with the issue of "pregnant women", as this became a huge issue with Johnson Controls, Inc. back in the early 1990's in their automotive battery plans (I was HR/Safety in one.) The case was based on discrimination against women as they were removed from "leaded" areas and/or denied opportunities in those areas. While this never officially went through OSHA, the  bigger issue you will have is ensuring you meet all the OSHA standards concerning the Lead Standard as for proper PPE, sanitation, clothing, footwear, etc., plus a proper medical surveillance program. Of course the best practices you can have to maintain the lowest exposure to lead is preferred.
 
From: ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU> On Behalf Of Monona Rossol
Sent: Thursday, August 01, 2019 7:03 AM
To: DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Lead contamination [was: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...
 
** CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe. **
So very interesting, Stephen.  The only thing I would add would be to your comment #1.
1.  I would think that your workers exposure would be minimal, and 
I wouldn't leave it to my "thinking" alone.  Why not do a lead wipe in the area and quantify the potential for exposure?   OSHA cites at 200 ug/ft2 for housekeeping violations under the OSHA Lead Standard.  So it certainly should be under this.  And you might want to go a lot lower if there are women who may be pregnant in the area.  The old HUD residential standard is 40 and the new is 10 ug/ft2.
 
And if the wipe sample level is high, I would be testing to find out how far the lead has been tracked around.  I will not go into a long story here -- only I'll tell you that in one case where there was lead dust like this, many nearby departments had floors that also exceeded the standards.  Wouldn't it be ducky to just KNOW if there is a problem or not?
 
Monona


-----Original Message-----
From: Stephen Stepenuck <sstepenuck**At_Symbol_Here**NE.RR.COM>
To: DCHAS-L <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU>
Sent: Thu, Aug 1, 2019 5:52 am
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Lead contamination [was: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...
Monona, et al.,
The "Boston EPA" results almost certainly came from the EPA Region 1 lab in Bedford, and I'll bet were done by Dr. Tom Spittler.  I did a sabbatical with him in the 1990s, and learned a lot.  Some community agency planning a garden on some of its property had brought a soil sample to him for a "routine check."  He found astronomically high levels of Pb, and communicated his serious concerns re a garden there.   He went on to document excess lead in countless other places, but alas I don't have a specific reference to a publication.  Hopefully the name, and the affiliation as Jim said  will be helpful.  
One irony of all that work was that the safety officer at the site pointed out that of course, no part of any of the samples he had received over the years-and there were drums of them by the time I arrived-could be disposed of as trash since they were of course hazardous waste.  [We won't think about 90-day limits because of course they might be used for something. ..].  Then came NIST [National Institute of Standards and Technology] to the rescue: would he please send them all the lead-contaminated soil he could muster, so they could use it to prepare an SRM [Standard Reference Material]  for sale to meet the burgeoning demand?  
 
As another list member has pointed out, lead contamination is ubiquitous.  I painted houses for a living for several years, and can attest that not only chips, but dust, as from when we used electric sanders, traveled far.  In fact, on a windy day and with a taller building, we had to ask people to move their cars from our side of the street, because the Pb-contaminated spatters had sometimes been so visible that litigation ensued.  Dr. Spittler once told me that the half life of Pb in soil is 2000 yr.   My students quantified it many years after it was banned in gas and paint.
Re the original post:
1.  I would think that your workers exposure would be minimal, and 
2. Since most cars still use lead batteries, those sheets should be a marketable commodity on the scrap market. 
Good luck.
 
Steve Stepenuck
 
--
Stephen J. Stepenuck, Ph.D.
Emeritus professor of chemistry
Keene State College
Keene NH 03435-2001
sstepenuck**At_Symbol_Here**ne.rr.com
603.352.7540
 
 
 
On 7/27/19, 10:13 AM, ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety on behalf of Monona Rossol  wrote:
 
 
And eating veggies from urban home gardens.  do you have a year or other identifier for that article.  Like to get a copy.
 
Monona

-----Original Message-----
From: James Kaufman <jim**At_Symbol_Here**LABSAFETY.ORG>
To: DCHAS-L <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU>
Sent: Sat, Jul 27, 2019 6:13 am
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Is lead sheeting a source of lead dust? And-Chemical Exposure question...
Boston EPA found that child lead poisoning went up in the summer (contrary to popular wisdom at the time) because of the lead pain chips in the soil around the homes when children were playing.  ... Jim
James A. Kaufman, Ph.D.
Founder/President Emeritus
The Laboratory Safety Institute (LSI)

A Nonprofit Educational Organization for Safety in Science, Industry, and Education
192 Worcester Street, Natick, MA 01760-2252
508-647-1900  Fax: 508-647-0062 
Cell: 508-574-6264  Res: 781-237-1335
Skype: labsafe; 508-401-7406 
Teach, Learn, and Practice Science Safely
 
 
 
On Fri, Jul 26, 2019 at 6:09 PM Monona Rossol <0000030664c37427-dmarc-request**At_Symbol_Here**lists.princeton.edu> wrote:
Beautiful Dreamer, List to my song.  
 
All the ground around buildings with lead roofs and lead/copper sheeting is usually high in lead.  I know from the building restoration projects I've been involved in.  And there was a big move a few years ago to continue to install lead roofs because they were what was here originally.  Bad idea. There are now stainless steel roofing materials that will last MUCH longer and don't release anywhere near the amounts of metals and no lead.
 
One of the reason they have to replace the lead roofing and flashing every 30 years or so is it has corroded way in spots or has thinned.  Where do you think that lead went?
 
 And the restorers on these projects do NOT publish the data on the soil around the building.  But I've seen it.
 
Monona
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