More fire-torn Altadena homes test positive for asbestos than Palisades — affecting cleanup times, Sen. Schiff says
More Altadena properties burned in the Eaton Fire have tested positive for asbestos — the mineral fiber
linked to lung cancer
and diseases like mesothelioma — than those being cleared in the Palisades Fire, Sen. Adam Schiff said Wednesday.
Schiff was visiting the site of the Eaton Fire, where crews wearing protective gear have been clearing out harmful contaminants like asbestos, when he told reporters the timeline of those cleanup efforts could be affected by the higher presence of asbestos found in the Eaton Fire site than in the Palisades.
Between the two wildfires, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has reported 2,269 properties have been completely cleared of hazardous material as of March 8. State fire officials say more than 16,000 structures, including everything from sheds and garages to larger buildings such as homes, were completely destroyed in the two deadly January wildfires.
"There are a higher number of homes here in the Eaton Fire burn scar than in the Palisades, apparently, that have asbestos," Schiff said as he spoke to reporters in Altadena Thursday. "So that affects the cleanup times."
While less than a third of properties burned in the Palisades Fire — or about 31% — have tested positive for asbestos, roughly 50% of properties in the Eaton Fire have tested positive, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
For more than 30 years,
several laws
pushed forth by federal agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency have been passed to restrict the use of asbestos after it was long used in construction. Now, it's more commonly found in older structures built before such laws.
Although more testing is being carried out for asbestos and other hazardous materials, warnings about exposure to the potentially cancerous substance have been issued for areas near the sites of the Palisades and Eaton fires.
Last month, the LA County Department of Public Health
issued a warning
saying homes within 250 yards of the two wildfires' burn sites were at risk of exposure to asbestos, hazardous chemicals and heavy metals such as lead.
UCLA researchers have
also warned
about the presence of airborne asbestos, lead and polyaromatic hydrocarbons, a class of chemicals
which federal health officials say
have been linked to the development of blood and liver abnormalities. The Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization also
issued its own warning
to the public just days after the two devastating wildfires broke out on Jan. 7.
Army Corps Colonel Sonny Avichal, who is the emergency field office commander for the Eaton Fire, said certified asbestos consultants and other specialists have been performing testing during cleanup efforts over the last several weeks.
Crews have been carrying out asbestos abatement by hand before larger scale debris removal efforts get underway, he said.
In the immediate aftermath of the January fires, health officials and experts warned about the presence of materials such as asbestos. With state fire officials estimating that 73% of structures in the affected areas were built before 1980, experts told The Mesothelioma Center that air quality near the wildfire sites could be affected.
"Asbestos will be in these burned down older buildings and thus it's best to wear a mask if you're near the smoke to prevent excessive inhalation of any asbestos fibers," Kaiser Permanente Oakland Medical Center thoracic surgeon Dr. Jeffrey Velotta
told The Mesothelioma Center's news site
.
"Wear masks if you're in the area. If it's a bad smoky area, then try to avoid being outside during that time," Velotta said.
Of 6,000 homes eligible for free debris removal by the Army Corps, there are still 1,200 properties in the Eaton Fire site that have not opted into the program, Rep. Judy Chu said as she spoke to reporters alongside Schiff Thursday.
With a deadline less than two weeks away, she urged homeowners and others who could be eligible to sign up.
The deadline for opting into the free debris removal process is March 31 and
more information on how to sign up can be found here
.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Yahoo
Coolest Space Photos of 2025 Will Fill You With Cosmic Wonder
There's always something happening in space, and humanity is documenting it more quickly and clearly than ever before. Orbiting telescopes, astronauts and spacecraft are sending back a stream of photos that show off the diversity and wonder of the universe. Here are some of the best space photos of the year, so far. It wasn't just imagery of objects beyond Earth that caught our eye over the first half of the year. The European Space Agency's Sentinel-2 Earth-observing satellite documented the devastating Palisades Fire in California in January. The Jan. 7 view showed a large smoke plume stretching out over the Pacific Ocean. That was just the beginning of a series of wildfires that destroyed residences and buildings in Los Angeles County. NASA astronaut and astrophotographer extraordinaire Don Pettit shared a knockout view of Earth from the International Space Station in late February. "Cosmic colors at sunrise; never get tired of seeing what the new day brings," he said. This photo has it all: our planet, swirling aurora lights and a sweeping vista of stars. It's tough to land successfully on the moon. Firefly Aerospace pulled off the feat in March with its Blue Ghost Mission 1. The Blue Ghost lander captured a historic view of a sunrise from the surface of the moon. The image shows the pockmarked lunar surface with the bright flash of the sun topping the horizon. Many moon missions, including Intuitive Machine's 2025 attempt, go wrong. That makes Blue Ghost's sunrise image all the more poignant. It marks a hard-earned lunar success story. The James Webb Space Telescope delivered a wild view of Herbig-Haro 49/50 in March. NASA described the space object as "a frothy-looking outflow from a nearby protostar" and a "cosmic tornado." Look for the distant spiral galaxy in the upper left. The venerable Hubble Space Telescope celebrated 35 years in orbit in April. NASA and ESA partied down by releasing a series of Hubble anniversary images, including views of Mars and a barred spiral galaxy. It's hard to pick just one anniversary image to highlight, but the telescope's ethereal view of the Rosette Nebula and its smoky clouds of gas and dust stands out. The nebula is a place of active star formation. Hubble's image focuses on one small, scenic part of the Rosette. NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers got some full-moon photography in during May's "flower moon." Ayers had a front-row seat to the glowing lunar action from her perch on the International Space Station. Ayers shared a series of photos with Earth in the frame, emphasizing the relationship between our blue planet and our lunar neighbor. NASA's Perseverance rover has been trucking around Mars since early 2021. The wheeled explorer marked its 1,500th Martian day on May 10 by taking a fresh selfie. Percy took dozens of images of itself using a camera mounted on the end of its robotic arm. NASA stitched the shots together to create the selfie. Look deeper into the image to spot a swirling dust devil dancing in the background. "Having the dust devil in the background makes it a classic," said Perseverance imaging scientist Megan Wu. "This is a great shot." The year is not even half over. There are full moons, auroras, space launches and meteor showers coming down the line. Satellites are watching over Earth. Space telescopes are staring out into the cosmos and sending back postcards from our universe. Stay tuned for more stunning images.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
EPA funds $281,000 to Arkansas to reduce lead in children's drinking water
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – The Environmental Protection Agency is investing in Arkansas drinking water to benefit children. The $281,000 in funding is to reduce lead in drinking water at schools and childcare facilities. Officials said the funding is in addition to the $200 million it has put into reducing lead in drinking water since 2018. EPA announces rollback for some Biden-era limits on 'forever chemicals' in drinking water In addition to this grant program, EPA's Training, Testing, and Taking Action (3T) program provides information and recommendations to help states and local authorities build voluntary programs to reduce lead in drinking water. Since 2019, this 3T program has helped over 20,000 child care facilities and nearly 13,000 schools have their water tested for lead with over 1,300 child care facilities and 2,500 schools completing remediation work. 'Lead is a neurotoxin that can negatively impact American children,' said EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin. 'With $26 million in funding this year, more schools will be able to identify sources of lead in their water and take action so that our nation's children can focus on learning, playing, and developing skills that will maximize their potential and make our nation stronger.' Trump EPA moves to repeal climate rules that limit greenhouse gas emissions from US power plants The Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act established the Lead Testing in School and Child Care Program Drinking Water grant in 2016 to award funding to states, territories, and tribes to assist local and tribal educational agencies in voluntary testing for lead contamination in drinking water at schools and child care facilities. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Yahoo
How poisonous mercury can get from coal-fired power plants into the fish you eat – Trump's EPA plans to weaken emissions rules meant to lower the risk
People fishing along the banks of the White River as it winds through Indianapolis sometimes pass by ominous signs warning about eating the fish they catch. One of the risks they have faced is mercury poisoning. Mercury is a neurotoxic metal that can cause irreparable harm to human health – especially the brain development of young children. It is tied to lower IQ and results in decreased earning potential, as well as higher health costs. Lost productivity from mercury alone was calculated in 2005 to reach almost US$9 billion per year. One way mercury gets into river fish is with the gases that rise up the smokestacks of coal-burning power plants. The Environmental Protection Agency established a rule in 2012 limiting mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants in an effort to improve air quality and public health. The first Trump administration moved to weaken the rule in 2020, arguing that the costs to industry outweighed the health benefit to the public. Then, the Biden administration tightened the regulations a few years later. Now, the Trump administration is proposing to weaken the latest regulations and, in addition, to repeal Biden-era limits on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, moves it hopes will boost coal power production. I study mercury and its sources as a biogeochemist at Indiana University. Before the EPA's original mercury rule went into effect, my students and I launched a project to track how Indianapolis-area power plants were increasing mercury in the rivers and soil. The risks from eating a fish from a river downwind from a coal-burning power plant depends on both the type of fish caught and the age and condition of the person consuming it. Mercury is a bioaccumulative toxin, meaning that it increasingly concentrates in the flesh of organisms as it makes its way up the food chain. The mercury emitted from coal-burning power plants falls onto soils and washes into waterways. There, the moderately benign mercury is transformed by bacteria into a toxic organic form called methylmercury. Each bacterium might contain only one unit of toxic methylmercury, but a worm chewing through sediment and eating 1,000 of those bacteria now contains 1,000 doses of mercury. The catfish that eats the worm then get more doses, and so on up the food chain to humans. In this way, top-level predator fishes, such as smallmouth bass, walleye, largemouth bass, lake trout and Northern pike, typically contain the highest amounts of mercury in aquatic ecosystems. On average, one of these fish contains enough to make eating only one serving of them per month dangerous for the developing fetuses of pregnant women and for children. In our study, we wanted to answer a simple question: Did the local coal-burning power plants, known to be major emitters of toxic mercury, have an impact on the local environment? The obvious answer seems to be yes, they do. But in fact, quite a bit of research – and coal industry advertising – noted that mercury is a 'global pollutant' and could not necessarily be traced to a local source. A recurring argument is that mercury deposited on the landscape came from coal-burning power plants in China, so why regulate local emissions if others were still burning coal? That justification was based on the unique chemistry of this element. It is the only metal that is liquid at room temperature, and when heated just to a moderate level, will evaporate into mercury vapor. Thus, when coal is burned in a power plant, the mercury that is present in it is released through the smokestacks as a gas and dilutes as it travels. Low levels of mercury also occur naturally. Although this argument was technically true, we found it obscured the bigger picture. We found the overwhelming source of mercury was within sight of the White River fishermen – a large coal-burning power plant on the edge of the city. This power plant emitted vaporous mercury at the time, though it has since switched to natural gas. We found that much of the plant's mercury rapidly reacted with other atmospheric constituents and water vapor to 'wash out' over the city. It was raining down mercury on the landscape. Mercury emitted from the smokestacks of coal-fired power plants can fall from the atmosphere with rain, mist or chemical reactions. Several studies have shown elevated levels of mercury in soils and plants near power plants, with much of the mercury falling within about 9 miles (15 kilometers) of the smokestack. When we surveyed hundreds of surface soils ranging from about 1 to 31 miles (2 to 50 km) from the coal-fired power plant, then the single largest emitter of mercury in central Indiana, we were shocked. We found a clear 'plume' of elevated mercury in Indianapolis, with much higher values near the power plant tailing off to almost background values 31 miles downwind. The White River flows from the northeast to the southwest through Indianapolis, opposite the wind patterns. When we sampled sediments from most of its course through central Indiana, we found that mercury levels started low well upstream of Indianapolis, but increased substantially as the river flowed through downtown, apparently accumulating deposited mercury along its flow path. We also found high levels well downstream of the city. Thus a fisherman out in the countryside, far away from the city, was still at significant risk of catching, and eating, high-mercury fish. As of 2022, in Indianapolis, pregnant women were still advised to avoid eating some fish from the White River altogether. The EPA created the Mercury and Air Toxic Standards rule, or MATS, to deal with the exact health risk Indianapolis was facing. The original rule stipulated that mercury sources had to be sharply reduced. For coal-fired power plants, this meant either installing costly mercury-capturing filters in the smokestacks or converting to another energy source. Many converted to natural gas, which reduces the mercury risk but still contributes to health problems and global warming. The MATS rule succeeded in reducing mercury emissions from power plants. It also helped tilt the national energy playing field away from coal. In 2020, the Trump Administration, in an attempt to bolster the declining U.S. coal industry, rescinded a 'supplemental finding' that it is 'appropriate and necessary' to regulate mercury from power plants. In 2022, the Biden Administration moved to reaffirm that supplemental finding, and it followed with stronger regulations in 2024. Now, the Trump administration is planning to pull back again. The new EPA proposal will go through a comment period, which will take time, but it sends a signal to the industry. Environmental groups expect to challenge the moves in court. Some economists initially calculated the net cost of the MATS rule to the U.S. electricity sector to be about $9.6 billion per year. This is roughly equal to estimates of productivity loss alone from the harm mercury emissions cause. The overall benefits of the rule were estimated to be higher. To a public health expert, this math problem is a no-brainer. Protecting the health of generations of Americans today and in the future matters. This is an update to an article originally published Feb. 15, 2022. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Gabriel Filippelli, Indiana University Read more: The US is making plans to replace all of its lead water pipes from coast to coast Gold rush, mercury legacy: Small-scale mining for gold has produced long-lasting toxic pollution, from 1860s California to modern Peru The risk of preterm birth rises near gas flaring, reflecting deep-rooted environmental injustices in rural America Gabriel Filippelli does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
