Still not open.
Open are two questions.
Will health officials allow customers into the facility to retrieve their bottles?
Will health officials require hazmat inspections of such bottles?
The Noo Yawk WineCare debacle involved only water and mold damage, fraud, and bankruptcy, which could all be remediated relatively easily.
And its Facebook site is, er uh, on lockdown.
So they sent out a note this morning that they have reopened the basement (wine storage area) and the first floor. There are two floors above not yet open (or remediated, I assume).
I am extremely hesitant to enter this facility. As little care as they took in demolition that resulted in the problem, I fear that the remediation efforts are far from top notch as well.
Even having the employees meet you at the loading dock with your wines is not good, for either the hapless employees or you.
You may wish to consider filing an insurance claim for total casualty loss.
I stopped by yesterday. The people working on construction do not appear to be wearing any special gear. The elevator is sealed/closed off as is the stairwell going up. Basically with some sort of plastic sheet and tape with warning about asbestos. I plan to bring some sort of filter to wear over nose and mouth for future visits as a protective move along with some sort of sanitary wipes to clean up after exiting.
Earlier in my career, I did some consulting work in this area. I will give a few tips in order to help everyone protect their health, but keep in mind that my knowledge of the situation is limited to what is in this thread, and doing or not doing the things that I note here may or may not protect you from any potential exposure. If you have significant concerns, contact a local environmental services company for advice. Normally if, you want to protect yourself from asbestos exposure, you would want to go to your local hardware or even better, industrial safety store and purchase a half-mask respirator with p-100 cartridges to use. Ideally these are properly fit. I am sure google can help on more detail here. However, what I would really do is ask ownership to see the results of air tests taken in the facility. If OSHA was involved (bear in mind I am Canadian, so OSHA knowledge is what it is), they would likely have required testing of some kind to allow people to re-enter the facility. Asbestos will travel through the ventilation system, so even if they were only working on other floors, be sure to ask for results from the area where your wine was stored. When retrieving bottles, I would use a wet cloth to wipe the dust off of them (while wearing the mentioned respirator). I also would not move bottles out of the storage facility (read: into my car or home) without taking the dust off of them.
Jeff
One should check if one must have a permit to transport items from an asbestos-contaminated site.
Pretty much take the precautions mentioned above, but remember that the damage from asbestos is similar to that of other small particles - it’s essentially mechanical, initially at least. And from being exposed only a few times, probably less of a concern than driving on the freeway with your windows open. You can help keep dust down by damp or wet rags or by washing off the bottles.
Frankly I’d be more worried about the government and code enforcement people at this point. Your wine is not damaged and you probably aren’t either, but that’s not going to stop them from doing something crazy.
Best of luck!
Thanks for the tips - every little bit helps!
If you are able to pick up the wines, can the operator provide a water hose there, in order for you to rinse off the bottles right there…obviously while suited up safely? Doing so now would be better than when the weather gets hot and sunny.
Also, consider that, if you move the bottles to a new facility, it may ask if where they previously were.
What a pain…
That really blows Rob. I store at The Lockup on Kinzie and have had no problems with them.
Jeff’s comments mirror mine. Perhaps The Lockup will let you transfer your storage to a similar sized locker at Kinzie? This would give you piece of mind that you’re completely out of the building.
I haven’t been in to the Lock-Up for several months (I moved to the DC area in 2010, but still keep two lockers there because the pricing blows away anything I can find out here), so I can’t speak about any apparent increase in dust. But because of the temp/humidity controls (especially compared to the rest of the building), it almost certainly should be on a separate HVAC system. That should mitigate a great deal of any potential issues with airflow from the rest of the building (if it was, in fact, asbestos). My bigger concern is that they have not yet been allowed to put the elevator back in service, and I was planning a trip to swap out 20 or so cases.
I don’t want him to move these diseased bottles to one of my lockups
See my earlier post in that sentiment.
Yes, elevator was not operational when I was there Saturday.
Jeez, they’re not diseased. They have asbestos dust on them. Wipe the damn things off.
+1. The fear mongering by a few people on this thread is ridiculous.
Agree that this is much ado about not much. I have zero trepidation about the facility or my wine.
Don’t have a dog in this fight, but I did spend years working on OSHA issues in Washington DC (wood dust, formaldehyde, and more). These issues are real, and not to be taken lightly. Jeff’s advice above is on point -
Google “mesothelioma” and ask yourself whether you want to take even a 1 in a million chance of getting it.
I have no idea whether washing the bottles will suffice to remove the exposure issue going forward. I’d want 100% certainty that there was not even a trace amount of asbestos in anything that was likely to come into my home at some point, around my family.
But I do know that if I were washing them, I’d be wearing a moon suit with the appropriate respirator, and discard everything before coming home.
I would also want some iron-clad assurance from the facility that 100% of the issue has been addressed, and that there were no trace amounts of asbestos, waiting to surface in future years.
But if it were me, I’d be more likely to file an insurance claim as a total loss.
Why take a chance?
An insurance claim seems the best route, especially as the insurer can then research the evolving site situation, potentially gaining key facts for any decision, either way.