It started off as a pain in the back he couldn't get rid of. He went to one doctor after another but nobody could figure it out. He'd get colds much worst than normal and issues of lung infections. Then he got pneumonia. Then Mesothelioma... He always worried about it.
He worked at Oyster Creek when the plant was new. They were having main condenser tube leaks. Somebody came up with the bright idea of dumping asbestos in the inlet of the main condenser. Some of asbestos fibers would get sucked into the tiny holes and close off the leak. Most of the asbestos by the tons went into bay. He dumped tons of this stuff in a mixing tank over many years. It worked kinda good.
I visited him in the hospital in the last week of his life. He had one lung removed two years prior...he kinda thought it was caught. It was just wishful thinking. Then it got into the second one. It is like slowly drowning to death. It is a horrible horrible death. He had two beautiful daughters. He was so proud of them. They went through many boyfriends...they were beautiful. We worked together during the teenage years and marriage years. My kids were much younger. He told me pitifully, the girls always had the upper hand. Don told me his daughters were always in control of the boyfriends. It was total control. It was sickening how slavish the boys and would-be husbands were to his daughters. Both of them! Don smugly would declare, "the young men by the dozens didn't have any dignity at all?
Alabama judge awards $3.5 million in mesothelioma death case involving TVA plant
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on October 06, 2015 at 6:21 PM, updated October 06, 2015 at 6:27 PM
The family of a Florence woman who died in 2013 from the lung disease mesothelioma will receive a $3.5 million award for her pain and suffering and medical expenses.
Court records dating back to 2012 show Barbara Bobo inhaled secondhand asbestos fibers while laundering her husband's work clothes for more than two decades. Bobo's husband, James, did clean-up work for a period of time after asbestos insulation was installed at the Athens-based Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant, which is owned and operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority.
James Bobo, who began working for the plant in 1975, died of asbestos-induced lung cancer in 1997. His wife was diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma, a rare lung cancer caused by asbestos exposure, in November 2011.
Judge Lynwood Smith of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama last week issued a judgment in favor of Melissa Ann Bobo and Shannon Jean Bobo Cox, Bobo's daughters and the co-personal representatives of her estate.
Dallas attorney Jay Stuemke, of Simon Greenstone Panatier Bartlett, PC, said Smith found Browns Ferry violated worker safety regulations set by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), as well as its own safeguards.
"This didn't have to happen," said Stuemke, who represents the family. "If the TVA had simply followed the law and its own guidelines, these two people might still be alive."
TVA spokeswoman Kristine Shattuck-Cooper said in an emailed statement the corporation is reviewing the Court's opinion and evaluating its options.
Bobo underwent surgery after her 2011 diagnosis to remove the lining in her affected lung. She also received chemotherapy treatments, which Simon Greenstone Panatier Bartlett, PC, said were painful and resulted in adverse side effects.
Court documents say Bobo, who was never an employee or contractor of TVA and was never physically inside the plant, would shake out her husband's work clothes in her home washroom, causing dust to disperse into the air. She would clean the floors of the washroom with a broom and dustpan, creating airborne dust she breathed.
A February filing said Bobo also had non-occupational exposure to asbestos from 1965-1975 when her husband worked as a machine operator for the Alabama Wire Plant in Florence. Additionally, she was exposed to asbestos during her years working as a beautician in Florence.
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