Opinion ID: 6986485
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Asbestos Content of Dust

Text: Plaintiffs’ expert witnesses testified that visible dust from gaskets or packing would likely contain hazardous levels of asbestos. Dr. Albert Miller testified that although asbestos fibers are invisible to the naked eye, when a worker sees visible dust coming from asbestos-containing products, it “means that there’s a very high concentration of asbestos” in the air. Dr. Steven Markowitz then expanded on this testimony, explaining: you really don’t get visible asbestos dust until probably five or ten fibers per cubic centimeter of air. That’s a high level. By comparison, the current allowable level by the federal government is one-tenth of one fiber per cubic centimeter of air. When you see visible asbestos dust, you are dealing with at least five or ten fibers per cc; in other words, 50 to 100 times what is now allowed. Dr. Markowitz farther testified that: working around visible dust creates a “high level of hazard of the asbestos-related diseases”; when a worker is exposed to a variety of asbestos products, all of which are releasing visible dust, “all those exposures contribute[] to that person’s risk” and there is no way to determine “which fiber is not responsible”; and Caruolo’s exposures to dust emanating from gaskets contributed to Caruolo’s mesothelioma, because: [t]hey were part of the totality of the exposure. He worked with these materials ... he pulverized [them], they became airborne, and he breathed them in. So there is no way one can say they didn’t contribute. To the contrary. All of his exposures contributed to his meso-thelioma, including this one. Dr. Markowitz conceded on cross-examination that he had never done air sampling for fiber release from asbestos products, that such sampling would be outside his field of expertise, that he had never seen gaskets or packing installed or removed, and that he was unaware of any studies associating the use of asbestos-containing gaskets and packing (as distinct from other asbestos-containing products) with the development of mesothelioma. However, on re-direct, Dr. Markowitz testified that he was familiar with two articles that discuss the results of tests involving gaskets and packing, in which Dr. James Millette measured the amount of asbestos fibers released when packing and gaskets are removed and found a range of up to one to four fibers per cubic centimeter, a level that Dr. Markowitz characterized as “clearly beyond what’s around now and is clearly hazardous.” We think that Dr. Markowitz’s testimony about the asbestos content in visible dust emanating from asbestos-containing products, and his testimony about Dr. Mil-lette’s study, furnished an evidentiary basis for a finding that the dust described by Caruolo as emanating from Crane’s products contained hazardous levels of asbestos. It is true that Dr. Markowitz could point to no studies measuring asbestos released from products manufactured by Crane; and on re-cross, Dr. Markowitz could not recall whether Dr. Millette’s tests involved Crane’s products, whether the tests simulated Caruolo’s use of the gaskets and packing, or whether other similar studies existed. Dr. Markowitz’s testimony was further undermined by Crane’s expert witnesses, who testified that Crane’s products did not release hazardous levels of asbestos. Dr. Michael Matteson, an aerosol technologist who studies the measurement and movement of particles in air, used a hacksaw to cut five samples of (new and aged) Crane gaskets and packing and measured a release of only .0062 asbestos fibers per cubic centimeter, which is below the level in ambient air. Dr. Matteson also pounded gasket material with a hammer, observed visible particles, but found fiber release below the level in ambient air. Finally, Dr. Matteson tested fiber release during the removal and installation of packing, again measuring asbestos levels lower than in ambient air. Dr. Victor Roggli, co-author of Pathology of Asbestos-Associated Diseases, testified that for an asbestos exposure “to be a substantial contributing factor” to mesothelioma, the product, inter alia, “needs to create levels [of asbestos] in the environment which are substantially greater than the background levels in the environment.” Based on Dr. Matteson’s test results, Dr. Roggli concluded that it was “unlikely” that Caruolo’s exposure to Crane’s gaskets and packing was a substantial contributing factor to his mesothelioma. Dr. Roggli also explained that Dr. Millette’s study was not done in time-weighted averages and that if Dr. Millette had used such averages, his test results would have been at or below the level of asbestos in the ambient air. Dr. Markowitz’s concessions and the testimony of Crane’s experts cast doubt on much of Dr. Markowitz’s testimony. But it was the jury’s province to assess Dr. Markowitz’s credibility in light of all of the evidence. Moreover, doubt was cast on the expert testimony offered by Crane as well. For example, on cross-examination, Dr. Matteson admitted that his tests did not replicate the pressures and temperatures applied to the materials handled by Caruolo. More significantly, Dr. Matteson took up to five minutes to make a single cut into the gasket or packing material, likely minimizing the production of dust, whereas Caruolo’s work was much less meticulous. It was up to the jury to decide which testimony to credit and discredit.