Last week we closed buildings 30 and 30a (Chemistry) as a precautionary measure following the diagnosis of a doctoral student with higher than normal levels of heavy metals in his system. The student remains in a stable condition and is receiving specialist medical care in Cardiff.
The health of our staff and students is of paramount importance to us, and we have been working with external agencies as well as making our own tests and risk assessments to decide when it would be safe to re-open the buildings.
We have now conducted highly sensitive testing in a series of spaces on each of the floors in building 30, except level 2 which is still part of the ongoing Police investigation.
We are pleased to report that the findings of the tests show that levels of thallium and arsenic, even in areas where these substances are used for experimentation, are negligible. The maximum level for thallium in the samples was 1/1000th of the allowable Health and Safety Executive limits and for arsenic 1/600th of the Health and Safety Executive workplace limits. In addition, as part of our normal safety monitoring this building has undergone regular air testing for the last 5 years, and results show no trace of either substance.
This evidence in conjunction with our risk assessment now gives us complete confidence that it is safe to re-open levels 1,3,4 and 5 of these buildings from 07.00hrs on Tuesday 18 September.
In consultation with the Police we hope that the remaining facilities on level 2 will be able to re-open by the end of this week following their release by the authorities and our own rigorous testing.
This will in no way effect the arrival of new or returning students who are studying Chemistry or related subjects and courses will begin as scheduled at the start of term.