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Great. I spent all four years in highschool rebuilding car engines practically swimming in this stuff because my friends and I used it as a degreaser. We didn't

Great. I spent all four years in highschool rebuilding car engines practically swimming in this stuff because my friends and I used it as a degreaser. We didn't swallow it, but we did get blisters on our hands and it turned our skin white and ashy. Once I left highschool I stopped working on cars (discovered computers), but I wonder how screwed we are, or are going to be (we're all nearing our 60's even though we still have the maturity of 20 somethings).

pram 4y ago
My dad was an aircraft mechanic and he got a ton of tumors in his arm from whatever cleaning liquids they used at the time. It has given me a lifetime of paranoia, always wearing gloves when I’m working on some mechanical thing. All that shit is probably in the ground water though.
- BoorishBears 4y ago
  What's sad about this is that in 2023 there's still a subculture of mechanics who think it's "weak" or "unmanly" to use things like gloves when working on cars (and I'm pretty sure that extends to other forms of hands on work) We don't have the excuse earlier generations had, we know this stuff causes cancer, we know it seeps into your skin and doesn't come out just because you washed your hands well, but people still don't see a problem with going fist deep in used engine oil or dumping half a can of brake cleaner on something in an enclosed garage
- uoaei 4y ago
  Two football star athletes at a local high school (poor, majority-Black neighborhood) died of mysterious brain tumors about 5 years ago. Their high school is a few hundred feet down a gentle grade from a row of auto shops. The parents of the deceased were certain for years that the auto shops were the problem, and brought it up repeatedly to city council and the mayor, but no one acted on it. No one even tested the groundwater until a routine inspection of the high school's heating system in the basement a couple years later, where they found extremely unhealthy levels of TCE. I'm not sure if they ever started enforcing things better, but knowing the local government I doubt it.
kwhitefoot 4y ago
When? Trich has been recognized as a hazardous chemical in Europe for many decades.

pram 4y ago

My dad was an aircraft mechanic and he got a ton of tumors in his arm from whatever cleaning liquids they used at the time. It has given me a lifetime of paranoia, always wearing gloves when I’m working on some mechanical thing. All that shit is probably in the ground water though.

BoorishBears 4y ago
What's sad about this is that in 2023 there's still a subculture of mechanics who think it's "weak" or "unmanly" to use things like gloves when working on cars (and I'm pretty sure that extends to other forms of hands on work) We don't have the excuse earlier generations had, we know this stuff causes cancer, we know it seeps into your skin and doesn't come out just because you washed your hands well, but people still don't see a problem with going fist deep in used engine oil or dumping half a can of brake cleaner on something in an enclosed garage
uoaei 4y ago
Two football star athletes at a local high school (poor, majority-Black neighborhood) died of mysterious brain tumors about 5 years ago. Their high school is a few hundred feet down a gentle grade from a row of auto shops. The parents of the deceased were certain for years that the auto shops were the problem, and brought it up repeatedly to city council and the mayor, but no one acted on it. No one even tested the groundwater until a routine inspection of the high school's heating system in the basement a couple years later, where they found extremely unhealthy levels of TCE. I'm not sure if they ever started enforcing things better, but knowing the local government I doubt it.

kwhitefoot 4y ago

When? Trich has been recognized as a hazardous chemical in Europe for many decades.