N.C. State facilities staff recently discovered the glue used to hold up a fallen bulletin board in Tompkins Hall contained asbestos.

Asbestos is a construction material used prior to the 1980s because of its resistance to heat, fire, chemicals and electricity. If an asbestos product is disturbed, its tiny fibers can be released into the air and inhaled, which can lead to serious health problems such as lung cancer.

Because of these dangers, the U.S. government phased out asbestos during the 1980s.

However, some products installed prior to 1980 still contain asbestos. Last Saturday, workers cut out the sections of glue containing asbestos and reattached the corkboard to the wall with screws.

Tompkins Hall is one of the oldest buildings on campus. Originally built in 1901, it was rebuilt in 1914 after a fire and most recently renovated in the early 1980s, when Caldwell Hall was built between it and Winston Hall, according to N.C. State’s website.

Bob Kadle, instructional support for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences Information Technology and building liaison for Tompkins Hall, said the board has probably been mounted on the wall for about 30 years. Kadle said he thinks the incident is not an immediate danger, and there is a routine procedure already established to fix any problems.

“Everybody hears ‘asbestos,’ and goes crazy, but it’s only a problem when the material is disturbed, meaning drilled or sanded,” Kadle said. “I’ve been here for 10 years, and this is the first time something like this has happened.”

According to Johnny Cline, supervisor of facilities repair and renovations, the asbestos has not been disturbed to the point where it would be a threat to student and faculty health.

“The asbestos isn’t dangerous unless it’s ingested,” Cline said. “Any product would have to be pulverized somehow for the fibers to be released into the air and cause health problems.”

Cline also said asbestos removal procedures like this happen “occasionally” on campus, and usually nothing is repaired until needed—like when a bulletin board falls off a wall.

“Normally, you would sand the wall in order to repaint it, but sanding or disturbing the asbestos in any way would have released particles into the air,” Cline said. “Somebody can have asbestos under the tiles on their floor, and they won’t have a problem until some tiles break and they go in to re-level the floor.”

However, Kadle said it is possible there is more asbestos encased in other walls in the building.

Other bulletin boards were recently removed in Tompkins, Caldwell and Winston as part of a beautification process that included a new coat of paint in certain areas and other minor cosmetic improvements.

Cline said he also thinks the corkboard was probably mounted in the late 1970s to early 1980s, and that other corkboards in Tompkins weren’t necessarily installed at the same time or with the same materials.

According to Cline, N.C. State hired an external air quality control company to conduct an air quality test. The test concluded there were not any asbestos particles floating around after the repairs were finished.

Ken Kretchman, director of the environmental health and safety center, was unavailable for comment at the time of publication.