Ralph Zumwalde (NIOSH) to E. A. Piersall Transmitting Two NIOSH Papers on Asbestos Exposure and Mortality in Hard Rock Gold Miners (1976)

A March 12, 1976 cover letter from NIOSH's Ralph Zumwalde to Union Carbide's Metals Division safety director enclosing two NIOSH papers. The papers, presented in March 1975, report excess respiratory cancer and nonmalignant respiratory disease mortality among South Dakota gold miners and describe electron microscope analysis of amosite fibers in the mine air. The letter says the papers bear on the NIOSH proposal to lower the airborne asbestos standard.

What the document holds

• Page 1: Cover letter from Ralph Zumwalde (NIOSH) to E. A. Piersall (Union Carbide Metals Division), March 12, 1976, with cc notation to Larrison and Thurber
• Pages 2-15: Gillam et al., 'Mortality Patterns Among Hard Rock Gold Miners Exposed to an Asbestiform Mineral' (NIOSH paper presented 24 March 1975), with title page, text and references
• Pages 16-21: Tables 1-6 to the Gillam paper (cause of death, respiratory mortality, microscopic identification of fibers, fiber concentrations, size distributions, comparison of airborne fiber concentrations); OCR garbled
• Pages 22-28: Dement, Zumwalde and Wallingford, 'Asbestos Fiber Exposures in a Hard Rock Gold Mine' (NIOSH paper presented 24 March 1975), title page and text
• Pages 29-35: Figures 1-3 (electron micrographs, diffraction patterns, x-ray spectra) and data tables for the Dement paper; OCR largely garbled

People and organizations

From Ralph Zumwalde (Environmental Investigations Branch, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health) to Mr. E.A. Piersall (Safety Director, Union Carbide Corporation, Metals Division, Grand Junction, Colorado).

• Ralph D. Zumwalde (author)
• E. A. Piersall (recipient)
• Center for Disease Control (named)
• Metals Division (named)
• New York Academy of Sciences (named)
• NIOSH (named)
• Social Security Administration (named)
• South Dakota School of Mines (named)
• U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (named)
• U.S. Public Health Service (USPHS) (named)
• Union Carbide Corporation (named)

Related pages

Pages on our site about what this document covers: Amosite: Brown Asbestos and the US Navy · NIOSH · South Dakota Asbestos Exposure Sites: Worksites, Industries, and Trust Coverage.

About this copy

This is document Union Carbide 370 of the Union Carbide documents, documents produced and used as evidence in asbestos lawsuits against Union Carbide, 35 pages. Production numbers A18017 to A18050.