Workers near waste site complain of headaches, fatigue

(There were a number of serious health problems in Woburn which may have been the result of the toxic wastes in North Woburn and the contaminated ground water from G and H wells. Even though the relationship between the hazardous materials and the health problems had not been confirmed at this point, more and more people were beginning to believe they might have been affected. This included the employees of a company in North Woburn who felt their proximity to the wastes and the "odor" might not be good for their health. I attempted to perform an amateur epidemiological study with a control group of people who worked several miles away from the site. With some interesting results. The people I interviewed and surveyed at the downtown firm almost all expressed some concern about the hazardous wastes and had an elevated sense of their own possible exposure. But their perceptions were nothing compared to the people actually working on top of some of the buried wastes.)

By CHARLES C. RYAN

WOBURN -- An informal survey of workers at one of the businesses located adjacent to the toxic waste site in North Woburn shows they suffer from more headaches, fatigue, nausea and dizziness than another group surveyed.

A total of 22 employees at Woodcraft Supply Company on Atlantic Avenue out of the 75 employed there participated in the study, which also asked the same questions of a control group of 21 employees of a downtown business.

Woodcraft Supply is one of five buildings on Atlantic Avenue warned by the fire department to watch out for a build-up of explosive methane gas seeping from the ground.

The firm is one of the closest to the arsenic lagoon, chromium pits, and the bad-smelling hide piles.

The hide piles and tannery wastes thought to be buried under and near Atlantic Avenue are believed to be emitting hydrogen sulfide and methane gases, but tests for other gases have not been reported, though $150,000 has been allocated by the federal Environmental Protection Agency to conduct some air-monitoring tests of the area.

The survey was conducted by the Daily Times and the questions were prepared based on reports from residents in Woburn and Reading who have complained about the so-called "Woburn odor," and based on some of the health effects reported in other studies from some of the chemicals known, or believed, to be present at the waste site.

Seventeen of the Woodcraft employees or 77.2 percent reported fatigue or tiredness, compared to eight, or 38 percent in the control group.

Sixteen of the Woodcraft employees or 72.7 percent reported headaches, compared to five, or 23.8 percent in the control group.

Ten, or 45.4 percent of the Woodcraft employees, reported feelings of nausea, compared to one, or 4.7 percent, of the control group.

The most frequent complaint was dizziness and nine of the Woodcraft employees, or 40.9 percent reported that symptom, compared to one, or 4.7 percent in the control group.

Seven others, 31.8 percent, mentioned an inability to sleep, compared to two or nine percent who complained of the same symptoms in the control group.

Of the 22 Woodcraft employees surveyed, 18 answered the question on the length of time they have been employed at the Atlantic Avenue site and the average length of time the surveyed employees worked there was 25.8 months, a little over two years.

The business, which also has a branch on Montvale Avenue, moved to the Atlantic Avenue site about two and a half years ago in the fall of 1977.

Woodcraft Operations Manager Ernie Rogers said that the company is concerned about the symptoms the employees have been reporting and has encouraged attempts to find out if the nearness to the toxic wastes may be responsible.

Jean Shure, an employee who has been with the firm for the full time it has been at the new location, has been actively attempting to organize workers at other industrial park businesses to see if they can obtain some answers.

"My complexion is giving me a lot of trouble and it never used to before. People here feel tired a lot and they never used to," she explains.

She helped organize a meeting of industrial park employees Tuesday night at the Trinity Episcopal Church in an attempt to seek answers.

"Our boss is very involved in this," she said.

In addition to complexion problems, Shure said that she has had constant colds that don't seem to go away, sore throats, intestinal viruses and temporary upsets. She also said she has experienced "the shakes, or night chills."

In the section of the questionnaire where employees could note any other symptoms not included, they cited runny noses, burning around the eyes, several reported constant colds, two cited asthma, two complained of difficulty breathing when the odor was strong, and one cited "a lot of headaches," even after marking it in another part of the survey.

Woodcraft Supply is one of the country's largest suppliers of artisan tools for working with wood, with customers from Martha's Vineyard to California and overseas.

According to Manager Rogers, they do not handle chemicals or solvents.

He said that he, himself, has not experienced any health symptoms, but noted he has only been at that location for six months.

He said several things made him concerned about possible health problems in the area. The first was the fire at a nearby building last winter when health officials were talking about evacuating surrounding areas, based on the belief the burning building contained a number of hazardous chemicals -- a belief that later proved to be incorrect, as the state had looked at the wrong company's file in determining the chemicals likely to be present.

Rogers said the second thing that made him concerned was "the odor."

"Nobody really knows the totality of what might be here," he said. "A lot of testing still needs to be done."

EDITOR'S NOTE: The survey this story is based on was an informal and unofficial survey. It should not be viewed as a professional or medical study. The survey was undertaken in an attempt to determine whether or not complaints about possible health effects from employees and residents had any statistical validity.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The publisher of the Daily Times was very upset when the above story was published. He was angry because the control group I had used consisted of employees at the Daily Times and I hadn't asked his permission before I had surveyed them. Curiously, he wasn't upset about the questions asked of the employees at Woodcraft Supply, since I had no permission to question them, either.