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Asbestos Mine of Canari

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Bastia

Canari

Asbestos Mine of Canari

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Location: Canari, Bastia, Corsica, France

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1. View of Nonza – Panorama View loop from Lupino

126km

09:04

2,580m

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2. Golfu Alisu – Vue sur la Tour d'Albo loop from Port de Centuri

71.5km

05:14

1,630m

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3. Panorama View – View of Nonza loop from Nonza

68.9km

05:03

1,580m

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Wolfgang-WS711

May 31, 2024

Doomed to eternity: In one of the most beautiful spots in Corsica, the ruins of the Canari asbestos mine remind us of man's obsession with making things possible.

By Karl Spurzem and Loris Poidvin

It is one of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful, coastal road in the Mediterranean. From Centuri in the north to Saint-Florent, the tightly winding Corniche runs along the west coast of Cap Corse. On the right, deep below, the inky blue of the sea, on the left the Mediterranean palette of marble-grey rock, the silver of the olives, the matte emerald green of the maquis. Add to that the warm wind, the scent of wild thyme - paradise seems to lie behind every bend.

But the dream journey ends abruptly. Between Canelle and Ogliastro, a huge concrete structure suddenly crouches on the rock that drops steeply into the sea - thrown down, it looks like a juggernaut, surreal, like a shattered spaceship or a dead prehistoric creature. It is the Canari mine, the largest open-cast asbestos mine in Europe in the middle of the 20th century.

From the street, only the factory building can be seen. It rises up the rock in terraces, windows with broken glass, roofs full of holes, only the facade facing the street is covered with tarpaulins. Scattered signs prohibit entry to the ruins or warn of health risks. The signs do not say why.

It takes some imagination, but this ruin was the pride of Corsican industry for two decades and its product was the source of wealth that the eternally poor island had never known before. Because half the post-war world was hungry for asbestos.

The mine began operations in 1946. It was owned by the Société Minière de l’Amiante, its main shareholder Eternit, an Austrian-German-Belgian group that was founded in the 1920s and became a global company with asbestos. His successful product, fiber cement, was considered a miracle material.

If asbestos didn't exist, it would have to be invented. The silicate minerals found in some rocks around the world, which crystallize in thread-like forms, can be processed into industrially usable fibers, which is why they are called mountain flax. They are incredibly strong, non-flammable, acid and weather-resistant, have outstanding insulating properties, can be easily mixed with other materials and can even be spun. With countless applications - in the shipyard, construction and automotive industries, in the electrical and textile industries - asbestos has become indispensable.

If asbestos didn't exist, millions of people would have led longer, healthier lives. Its fibers are so fine that they are "alveolar-permeable", reaching the most delicate branches of the bronchi up to the alveoli, the lung sacs, where they cause terrible damage. They cause chronic inflammation, which leads to abestosis, a pathological change in the lung tissue, which in turn leads to lung cancer and, particularly often, mesotheliomas, which are malignant tumors of the peritoneum. The devilish thing about asbestosis is its enormous latency: it takes between ten and 60 years for the cancer to break out. By then it is often too late for a curative therapy - and the cause is usually not identified.

The risks of asbestos dust have long been known. Asbestosis was first described in 1906, lung cancer as a result of asbestos exposure was recognized as an occupational disease in 1943, and it has been officially classified as carcinogenic since 1970. Individual countries banned asbestos earlier, but it took until 2005 for the EU to ban its use - the result of aggressive lobbying by producers, who in many countries achieved years of delays in classifying it as a hazardous substance. Asbestos is still mined and processed in emerging countries.

This is an excerpt from the text. You can read the entire article in mare No. 152. Subscribers can also read it here in the mare archive - mare.de/archive/login.

Translated by Google •

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Location: Canari, Bastia, Corsica, France

Asbestos Mine of Canari

1. View of Nonza – Panorama View loop from Lupino

2. Golfu Alisu – Vue sur la Tour d'Albo loop from Port de Centuri

3. Panorama View – View of Nonza loop from Nonza

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