Cathedral renovations cause leaks, damage to rooms, exposure of asbestos

With thousands of gallons of water soaking the outside of the Cathedral of Leaning during… With thousands of gallons of water soaking the outside of the Cathedral of Leaning during its summer cleaning, a drop or two was bound to seep inside.

When Elizabeth Monasterios, chair of the Hispanic languages and literatures office, left her office on Friday, May 25, she wasn’t worried about a small leak.

But she returned after the weekend and found more than a drop seeping through the ceiling. The water had soaked 200 volumes from a collection of books shelved on an interior wall, and saturated paint peeled off from around the windows.

“This is unbelievable, it destroyed my whole collection,” she said, adding that she hopes to be reimbursed for the cost of the damaged books.

Another office in Monasterios’ department had to be sealed off because of a

“toxic” smell coming from its leaking windows, she said.

According to building cleaning professional Ed Perry, such smells come with the territory when using chemical cleaning methods, such as the glass-infused water being sprayed on the Cathedral.

He also said that years of ingrained dirt removed from the limestone facade might contribute to the odor hanging in the air.

Despite the smell, project foreman Rich Novicki said the cleaning solution “won’t hurt at all.”

But leaking wasn’t just confined to floor 13.

The Pitt News obtained from Facilities Management workers in the Cathedral a list of rooms on 13 floors needing maintenance in June because of the leaks. As of the beginning of June, the basement, ground, first, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, 11th, 13th, 19th, 20th and 23rd floors had suffered water damage and flooding.

At the time, workers had not yet washed the upper floors of the Cathedral because of the nest of endangered peregrine falcons on the 40th floor.

Two nationality rooms, the Czechoslovak and English rooms, saw flooding that required repairs, Nationality Rooms Director E. Maxine Bruhns said.

Water trickled from the ceiling behind one of the murals in the Czech room, and custodians removed the area from its framing and allowed it to dry out.

Leaks also buckled the flooring in the English room, but Facilities Management workers quickly tended to repairs.

On one Thursday in June, stairwell C, located on the Bigelow Boulevard side of the Cathedral, collected puddles of water that had streamed down the walls, from the ceilings, out of three light sconces and onto the floor.

The third floor landing was impassible for the day because of the standing water.

Two and three floors up in the English department, water had disrupted multiple offices.

The ceiling of the advising office on the sixth floor lost several tiles after they became saturated with water coming in through the window frame.

According to English adviser Fiore Pugliano, ceiling tiles and the insulation behind them fell because of the water seeping through mortar cracks.

When he called for maintenance assistance to fix the problem, they responded immediately, he said.

“We were notified in advance that this would happen,” he said.

Pugliano said the biggest leak in the English department was in department chair David Bartholomae’s office. He added that Bartholomae temporarily moved out of his fifth floor office to escape the damage. Department administration would not comment.

As for official word from the University on the floods, spokesman John Fedele said only that “there has been minimal damage on the inside.”

Project manager Tony Dechilles said that the University is underwriting the costs of the damage.

Fedele did not comment on how much more this damage will cost the University in addition to the original budget.

Asbestos problems also arose in the department in May.

Jennifer Florian’s film studies office on the sixth floor was one of two rooms where custodians originally found asbestos while working to stop window leak above the radiators.

The custodians opened the enclosure around a radiator that sat beneath a window in Florian’s office, and insulation material that contained asbestos was damaged on the edge.

Asbestos, used in insulation in older buildings, can cause lung diseases like scar-tissue buildup and loss of organ function when fibers become airborne if it is disturbed during renovations or demolition, according to the U.S. Department of Labor website.

Because Florian’s office had an exposed portion of asbestos affected by the leaking and posed a potential health hazard, Florian called Pitt’s environmental health and safety department.

Frank Pokrywka, the health and safety industrial hygienist and an asbestos expert, looked at the problem along with tradesman and said the problem was contained within days.

“It was never a [health] concern,” he said. “The material was such a minor amount, it wouldn’t have been an issue.”

But Florian was concerned with the situation, and she worked at home for two days after learning of the asbestos exposure.

“It was disturbed or airborne,” she said. “They told me I could still work in the office, but I felt uncomfortable with it.”

Now, the asbestos is encapsulated in the office, and Pitt health and safety was ready to address any more asbestos concerns if they arose.

“We have a practice of abating it when we find it,” Pokrywka said, adding that hundreds of buildings on campus probably have contained, unexposed asbestos in them that is not dangerous.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration requires employers to reduce asbestos exposure to the lowest level possible and record all noted instances of employee exposure for 30 years.

In the Cathedral, some floors still have asbestos sealed under old radiator covers, under floor tiles or in pipe insulation. But many floors have been renovated in the past, and the asbestos was removed then, Pokrywka added.

The University had contracted the Cost Co. to complete the $4.8 million project of removing 80 years of Pittsburgh steel industry soot and city acid rain from the exterior limestone masonry.

Before chemically cleaning the outside walls of the building, water cascaded down the walls to soak the limestone and loosen the grime for 12 hours at a time, University architect Park Rankin said.

About 20 workers sprayed water infused with glass powder through high-pressure hoses against the sides of the building to remove the dirt chemically.

Once the cleaning finished at the end of July, 10 masons are pointing, or re-applying, the mortar in sections of the exterior walls, and the windows will be re-caulked.

Tony Dechilles, the Cost Co.’s project manager for the Cathedral project, said the process causes “no harm inside the building,” but the original windows and mortar between the stones could never seal off the water completely.

Sock-like tubes meant to soak up water waited at the base of windows for leaks during the showering, and extra Facilities Management staff took care of complaints of floods.

Rankin acknowledged the possibility of dislodged mortar and openings around the windows.

“With old roofs and windows, this is to be expected,” he said of the interior flooding. “There really hasn’t been major permanent damage, but there were inconveniences.”

“I wouldn’t be concerned because it’s such a well constructed building,” he added, noting that the damage only spans a possible 1,000 to 2,000 feet inside the 600,000 square-foot building.

The cleaning of the 42-story tall Cathedral began in the spring and is scheduled to officially end in September, although the previously blackened exterior walls now sparkle a clean, sandy color.