Tonnes of asbestos removed from UN headquarters in US$2b renovation
Extraction of thousands of tonnes of insulation material that causes cancer is complete on iconic UN headquarters in Manhattan
A silent killer that stalked Nikita Khrushchev, Yasser Arafat, Fidel Castro and other world leaders as they gave historic speeches has been exhumed from the UN headquarters.
Enough asbestos to cover a football field more than five metres deep with lethal blue dust has been extracted from the building during a US$2-billion-plus renovation aiming to turn it into a clean, green Manhattan landmark, according to the chief architect.
World leaders who gather at the annual UN debate next week will see a gleaming modernist skyscraper, far from the gutted building they visited last year.
The East River tower, designed by an international team including Brazil's Oscar Niemeyer and French-Swiss legend Le Corbusier, is marking its 60th anniversary.
A white plastic sheet covers the leaking General Assembly dome, which will be the next stage of the project.
The headquarters was built at a time when asbestos was ubiquitous, said Michael Adlerstein, the preservation architect leading the diplomatic and technical exploit.
"It was put on like mayonnaise. It was put on every pipe, every wall," he said.