NAS Oceana battles mold in older buildings

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NAS Oceana battles mold in older buildings

by Mike Gooding

13NEWS / WVEC.com

Posted on February 24, 2011 at 3:17 PM

http://www.wvec.com/news/local/NAS-Oceana-battles-mold-in-older-buildings-116853\

718.html

Updated today at 6:18 PM

VIRGINIA BEACH -- Naval Air Station Oceana has a mold problem, but officials are

working hard to fix it.

The base has identified approximately 325 units in its Combined Bachelor Housing

that require mold remediation. Of them, many have already been repaired.

Overall, the master jet base provides housing in fifteen different buildings for

1,746 unmarried junior enlisted personnel and junior officers. The units are

either one, two or three bedroom apartments. The newest such facility is 16

years old. The oldest, 50 years old.

In forty-year-old Building 423, home to 203 sailors, officials identified 23

rooms which needed mold remediation. In nine, the work has been completed. There

are fourteen left to go.

The Navy says each of the rooms is inspected every week. And, whenever a sailor

moves out, the base housing department thoroughly inspects each newly vacant

room. Wallpaper is peeled back. And if mold is found the base Public Works

Department is called in to clean up the mold, repaint the walls and replace the

wallpaper.

The problem has to do with the extreme humidity associated with the base's

geographic location along the mid-Atlantic seaboard, causing moisture to seep in

through decades-old windows, ceiling and vents.

" We've got to fix it and so when we find it then we start to work to fix it, "

Oceana Commanding Officer, Capt. Jim Webb, told 13 News. " We have buildings here

that are up to 50 years old and so things that are going to come along with age

are going to happen. So we have leaky roofs, we have windows that tend to not

seal as well as they used to in the past. We have hearing and ventilation

systems that tend to age. So it causes problems with moisture, especially in the

climate we're in. "

Capt. Webb says, the solutions is vigilance.

" Our teamwork starts with our Bachelor Housing staff and then it goes to Public

Works, " he said. " So, together they look at the rooms, inspect them, try to get

a feel for where the problems are going to crop up. Sometimes it's behind the

wallpaper and then things that cover up the walls. So, an active role in trying

to find the problem, and teaming up to fix it. "

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, common household mold spores

can cause allergic reactions in sensitive individuals. The EPA says allergic

responses include hay fever-type symptoms, such as sneezing, runny nose, red

eyes, and skin rash.

Additionally the agency says, molds can cause asthma attacks in people with

asthma who are allergic to mold, and, mold exposure can irritate the eyes, skin,

nose, throat, and lungs of both mold-allergic and non-allergic people.