Product Description
Bethlehem Steel Corporation operated a nationwide network of shipyards — Sparrows Point (MD), Beaumont (TX), San Francisco (CA), Quincy (MA), Baltimore, and others — and structural fabrication plants across the eastern United States. According to publicly filed U.S. asbestos personal-injury and wrongful-death litigation, Bethlehem shipyards and fabrication plants specified asbestos-cloth welding curtains, safety blankets, and spatter shields as standard hot-work personal-protective and area-protective equipment throughout the woven-asbestos-textile era.
Plaintiffs alleged that these blankets were draped over adjacent equipment, hung as welding curtains between adjacent work stations, wrapped around cable and hose during hot-work, and used as personal protection over shoulders and legs during overhead welding. The material was allegedly composed of woven chrysotile-asbestos cloth, often in combination with amosite for higher-temperature service.
Workers Exposed
Trades allegedly encountering asbestos through Bethlehem Steel asbestos welding blankets include:
- Welders and burners using asbestos cloth as spatter shielding on themselves and adjacent equipment during shipyard fabrication and structural work.
- Shipfitters and boilermakers working alongside welders inside hulls, machinery spaces, and boiler rooms where welding curtains and blankets were draped for hot-work protection.
- Ironworkers performing structural welding on Bethlehem-fabricated bridge, building, and industrial-structure jobs.
- Marine machinists and pipefitters working adjacent to welding operations in shipyard fitting-out.
- Rigging and material-handling crews folding, storing, and issuing worn asbestos blankets from tool cribs.
Asbestos-cloth fiber release was allegedly especially high on worn blankets, where the woven surface had frayed and shed fiber during handling. Take-home exposure to shipyard families was commonly alleged.