Wednesday, November 5, 1997
HazMat cleans up threatening situations
Specialized team keeps campus, environment safe from hazardous
materials
By Steven Tanamachi
Daily Bruin Contributor
To all who cringe at the thought of chemical danger: have no
fear, HazMat is near.
The UCLA Hazardous Materials (or HazMat) team serves as a
guardian, protecting the campus and nearby communities from
potentially dangerous chemicals and pollution.
"Our primary responsibility is to respond to any incident that
involves hazardous chemicals or radioactive materials," said Rick
Greenwood, Director of the Office of Environment, Health and Safety
(EHS).
Joe Raab, the HazMat Team captain, elaborated on the program’s
two main missions: to contain hazardous materials, and to minimize
the effect any chemicals could have on UCLA property and its
surrounding environment.
About 400 tons of chemical waste were generated at UCLA last
year, mainly in the form of asbestos and solvents. To deal with
that amount, HazMat also has to work to prevent accidents.
The crew makes laboratory inspections and publishes public
notices in its efforts to create a safe environment.
Despite these attempts, there are occasional mishaps that
require their expertise. Eric Binder, the EHS specialist, said that
they deal with an average of one to two incidents every week.
Each one must be treated with special care, especially when
dealing with "the unknown materials … some can be explosive or
reactive and cause a flash fire," Binder said.
In the event of such an incident, "fear," said Raab, "is not an
issue."
"We categorize (the incident) into terms of what we want to
protect. First is life, second is property and third environment,"
Raab said. "It’s a common theology among the fire department and
the HazMat team."
Hazmat is truly a team. It also works in conjunction with the
fire and police departments. Many fire departments around the
nation have a specialized hazardous materials division.
The police department may be called in on emergencies for crowd
control and to evacuate the building.
Chemical accidents are nothing new for these unmasked crusaders.
Spills, odors and leaks have kept the crew on their feet.
"We’ve had small spills all the time … most common is mercury
in labs," Greenwood said.
Any danger from chemicals on campus is relatively low, he said,
"despite the tremendous usage."
UCLA is not the only college with a HazMat team, but its squad
is unique because of the amount of research that takes place within
the medical department.
"Ours is one of the most elaborate. We have so many labs that
use hazardous materials," Greenwood said.
There are roughly 600,000 chemicals estimated to be in use today
at UCLA.
Much to the credit of HazMat, the school is still standing. Last
spring, HazMat was called on to deal with a chemical explosion
which caused a small fire in the Life Sciences Building.
Recently, the team has been called on to respond to two major
accidents – a chlorine leak and a nitric acid spill.
Though over a dozen members of the team may be called to handle
a given incident, it’s not uncommon for just three workers to
handle the majority of a week’s work of disposing of the
community’s filth.
Along with Binder, Ray Marti, senior EHS technician, and Alex
Taflya, an EHS technician, can be found working in the chemical
storage unit on Circle Drive South or picking up chemicals from
labs on South Campus.
Many of the other employees trained to work with hazardous
materials work in the EHS Office, while others do lab inspections
or some other service. In the case of an emergency, each can be
notified immediately.
"We have an on-call system and a person to consult during off
hours. When we have an emergency, we inform everybody," Raab
said.
Roughly a decade ago, UCLA saw an emergency need to have a
department which specialized in chemicals. Thus, a team of chemical
crusaders was conceived. Since then, it has evolved into a more
specialized department.
"It’s been in its current form for three years," Raab said.
"It’s restructured to make sure we’re better and more prepared for
hazards."
All members of the team must have some previous knowledge of
hazardous materials, toxicology and are required to take a rigorous
40-hour course required by the California Occupational Safety and
Health Administration.
"We work on different scenarios and continually plan for the
worst-case scenario," Greenwood said of the HazMat workers’
training.
The team is ready to deal with real scenarios Monday through
Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. In the case of an emergency after hours,
calls are handled by the police department.
When threatened by radioactive goo and toxic slime, forget about
Superman and the Power Rangers. Who you gonna call? HazMat.
AELIA KHAN
Wearing a 60-pound suit, HazMat worker Alex Taflya handles
flammable liquids.