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Orange to remove mobile mast from 'tower of doom', where cancer rate has soared
Last updated at 23:52pm on 06.08.07
John Llewellin: Died last month
Three have died and another four have battled the disease since two masts were erected on the roof of the five-storey block which has become known locally as the Tower of Doom.
The cancer rate on the top floor - where residents of five of the eight flats have been affected and the three who died all lived - is 20 per cent, ten times the national average.
Residents of Berkeley House in Staple Hill, Bristol, also complain of terrible headaches and other ailments which they blame on radiation from the masts.
Orange has agreed to remove its mast after a five-year campaign by residents and pressure from the local authority. But it has caused anger with plans to move it to a residential street nearby.
The other mast belongs to Vodafone, which has no plans to move it.
The most recent death was that of John Llewellin, 63, who lost his battle against bowel cancer two weeks ago.
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Anger: The mast (circled) on the block known to locals as the Tower of Doom
Two years ago, Barbara Wood died in her 70s from breast cancer. Two years earlier Joyce Davies died, also from breast cancer.
Danger zone: Residents at this Bristol flat have suffered illness and death
The other victims on the top floor are Hazel Frape, 63, who has had breast cancer, and 89-year-old Phyllis Smith who moved out after she contracted the same disease.
On the fourth floor Bernice Mitchell, 69, has battled womb cancer. On the second floor, 78-year-old Barbara Watts, who has lived in the block for 31 years, is in remission from breast cancer.
Many of the 110 residents, including Doreen Sheppard, 74, have complained of headaches and other health problems.
She said: "The masts are bound to be doing something. I get terrible headaches and I've started suffering from Meniere's disease, where I lose my balance. I'm worried about the children on the estate as there are so many of them now."
Both masts were erected in 1994. South Gloucestershire Council served a notice asking for them to be removed when the ten-year contract expired three years ago.
But because current guidelines say there is no risk from radiation the council does not have a legal right to force their removal.
After a long legal battle Orange has submitted a planning application to put the mast on top of a shopping precinct in a street near homes, a primary school and a public library.
Left alone: Moira Llewellin's husband died of cancer, one of three flat residents to die
Jeanette McCormack, 69, who has led a campaign against the mast, said a petition against the new location had gathered more than 200 names.
She added: "People of all ages who live and work near the mast will be exposed to the radiation and so there's a lot of anger about it."
World Health Organisation guidelines have dismissed the risks of masts despite other evidence which has found they are harmful.
A spokesman for Orange said the company takes health and safety very seriously.
He added that the company was satisfied its mobile phone base stations do not present a health risk.
Vodafone is working on a new longterm lease from South Gloucestershire Council. A spokesman said the company took residents' concerns "extremely seriously" and would continue to work with them and the council to provide reassurance.
Up, up and away: Orange's controversial mobile phone mast will be no longer be a blot on the landscape
Reader views (14)
It is important to know, that not only there is a significant risk linked to what is now called electro pollution, one wants to know that there are also solutions available. Having experienced them and improved my quality of live significantly, I now choose to spread the word and talk about the issue and solutions.
I agree with the opinion of C.D. Thomson, that the science has its own limitations. I learned it the hard way, when my husband died, at age 35, of the consequences of a massive brain haemorrhage. His case had been studied in the best hospitals and universities, and, of course, scientific doctors who supposedly own the truth had told him for the last 2 years of his life that he had nothing, he was just too stressed out. The autopsy revealed, 10 months later, that he had brain cancer, likely more than one. By the way, he had used technology intensely in the last few years of his life, after going back to school and starting his own business.
Do you care to protect your brain and the health of your loved ones? There are solutions.
- Christine Veillette, Longueuil, QC, Canada
Those who understand probability and statistics will also understand that it is probable that a cancer cluster will occur in the absence of a cause ... just as sometimes coin flipping will produce "heads" ten times in a row.
However, it's also possible that the cancers have a real cause in common and that it's not the cell antennae.
Science does not always produce results that are neat and simple ... and moving those towers may do more psychological harm to the populace at large than it does good for the individuals presumptively in their zone of danger.
The jury is still out. People need to take stock of all the risks in their lives and pay attention to the ones that really matter.
- Mark Hankins, Land O Lakes, FL
Peter from Ireland, if there is no problem with that mast on the building, where is the cancer coming from then? Also are the masts near to the water tanks for the building? What are the masts doing to the buildings water supply? More questions than answers here.
- Jeff, Luton
According to the comment of Peter, our expert on the subject from Ireland, we should all trust the scientists and the doctors, and presumably the pharmaceutical companies, and, of course, the government. They all know what's best for us. University-brainwashed idiots study science, yes, but they never study the history of science. That would be embarrassing to their professors. Good scientists change their minds. New findings are always ridiculed. It generally takes 100 years for the culture-at-large and the establishment know-it-alls to catch up with the truth. If Peter honestly thinks there is no peer-reviewed scientific documentation to back up the toxic effects of cell phone towers, he doesn't spend much time reading, does he? Or he reads only from the approved list. By all means, outlaw mega amounts of vitamin C, while you warm up your coffee in a deadly microwave. The fragility and complexity of human health is under increasing attack. Lawsuits against corporate killers grab headlines, but do you know how many of these lawsuits are squelched before they ever are heard by a judge? The residents of these buildings need to move out en masse. Taking away one tower and leaving the other will not remove the risk. When the world economy collapses, the apartment leases won't be binding anyway. But you only have one life. Save it. Scram!
- C.D. Thomson, Quebec, Canada
I am an electrical engineer with my specialty being RF and while I am aware of all the scientific papers that say that mobile phones are safe, I am still concerned that there are undiscovered problems that will eventually crop up. We should err on the side of caution. I can say for a fact that when I have been using a phone near my ear for about 15 minutes, I get a strange discomfort in the area around my ear for about an hour afterwards. The only other time I get that feeling is when I am near high power TV or FM transmitters, only then I feel this discomfort all over my body. There is an effect there that is at a cellular level. After all, all our nervous system is based on electrical signals. The person who said that non-ionizing radiation only produces heat in the body is still living in the 1940s when Percy Spencer of Raytheon was surprised to notice a candy bar melt in his pocket when he was working with high power magnetrons (the valve in your microwave oven). This gave him the idea for the microwave oven. But that is another story.
- Benjamin Brown, Bristol, UK
I like Peter's logic. A whole load of people are dead who happened to be living near a mast, so he quotes from a report without telling us who financed it, or who had a vested interest in the outcome? Go read up HAARP. There is lots of info on the web about the huge military programs underway using radio waves, and none of these are beneficial to human life. The brain runs off electrical impulses, electromagnetic radio waves disrupt them. Just because someone says something is harmless it doesn't mean it is. Thalidomide? Cosmetics? Food additives? Human greed is more of a motivator than honesty every time.
- Rob, Bristol UK
Please compare this to the deaths and subsequent closing of the building (because of the masts) at R.M.I.T. Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Melbourne, Australia where something like 7 out of 10 working on the top floor got brain tumors. The odds of something like that not happening there were far greater, but it happened. It was something of a 'clear cut case'.
- Gary Love, Devonshire
I guess those people with cancer..it must be all in their head.
- Naseer Ahmad, Toronto Canada
The effect of Electromagnetic Radiation is very well researched. All research to date shows that there is no indication of risk from mobile phone mast radiation, and phone radiation. The UK, just as most countries in the world, has adapted the safety levels proposed by the ICNIRP (International Commission for Non Ionising Radiation Protection), endorsed by the EU.
Remember: Telephone mast radiation is at a level of one hundredth of the radiation coming from the mobile phone itself. If you choose, disregarding current scientific publications, to worry about mobile phone radiation, don't do so about the masts'.
And by the way: We are talking here about non ionising radiation, which is simply converted to heat, when hitting cells. (So small, that it is not noticeable; the 'hot ear' syndrome of mobile phone users stems from the fact that the mobile's battery is warming up when in use.)
The 'mast sanity' groups, and the gullible press supporting them, are the exclusive source of damaging people's health in this regard. Several studies, the latest being the well publicised Essex study, have shown that 'electrosensitive' people feel ill solely due to the placebo effect.
- Peter, Ballyhaunis, Ireland
I bet every person who has signed the petition owns a mobile phone. Most of the residents in the flats probably do as well. They all love their mobile phones, just as long as the masts are put near someone else!
- Stephen, London
It's very simple - if you think that mobile phone masts are harmful, stop using a mobile phone and persuade everyone you know to to the same. No mobile phones = no need for phone masts.
- Sarah N., London
This reminds me of some years ago when there was a clear indication of an increased risk of cataracts for VDU operators, in particular those who are short sighted. Many reports were put out saying there was no evidence for this whist many opthalmologists and eye surgeons disagreeded. Fortunately changes in VDU design have reduced the amount of radiation. However one tends to think that like many things the bottom line is the most important issue!
- Michael, London
There's no conclusive proof masts cause cancer, but if they are safe I'm sure the phone company bosses will volunteer to have them on their own houses.
- Dorothy, London, UK
But surely according to last week's report mobile masts are absolutely harmless and any problems associated with them are completely psychosomatic? The fact that every other country in Europe has much lower levels of EM radiation coming from their masts because they are concerned about the lack of research into EM radiation on health is just because everyone else is completely paranoid, or is it?
- Pa Roddy, London
