About Cleveland-Cliffs Burns Harbor Middletown Ohio

The Facility’s History and Operations

The Middletown Works sits in Butler County along the Great Miami River and has operated for well over a century. The facility has passed through multiple corporate owners:

  • Armco Steel (historical ownership)
  • AK Steel (mid-to-late 20th century)
  • Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (following acquisition in March 2020)

At peak employment, the facility supported thousands of workers across multiple operational areas and trades. The Middletown Works is part of a broader Ohio steel industry legacy that includes Republic Steel’s Youngstown operations, Cleveland-Cliffs’ Cleveland operations, and other integrated mills that made Ohio one of the most concentrated asbestos-exposure regions in the country. Ohio unions serving workers at these facilities historically included USW Local 1307 (Lorain), Boilermakers Local 900, and Asbestos Workers Local 3 (Cleveland), among others representing workers across the state’s steel corridor.

Operations at the Complex

The Middletown Works historically ran the full spectrum of integrated steel production:

  • Blast furnace ironmaking
  • Basic oxygen furnace (BOF) steelmaking
  • Continuous casting
  • Hot strip and cold rolling mills
  • Galvanizing and coating lines
  • Coke ovens (historically)
  • Power generation and utility systems

Why Asbestos Was Used in Steelmaking

Steelmaking generates sustained extreme heat. Blast furnaces ran above 2,000°F. Basic oxygen furnaces exceeded 2,900°F. Steam systems and boilers operated at extreme temperatures and pressures throughout the plant. Before the industry acknowledged asbestos as a carcinogen, manufacturers marketed asbestos-containing materials as the standard solution for thermal insulation and fireproofing.

The same types of asbestos-containing products that may have been used at the Middletown Works were also reportedly present at other major Ohio steel and manufacturing facilities — including Republic Steel in Youngstown, Cleveland-Cliffs’ Cleveland operations, Goodyear’s Akron facilities, and B.F. Goodrich’s Akron plants — reflecting an industry-wide pattern of ACM use throughout Ohio’s manufacturing sector. Manufacturers including, (headquartered in Toledo, Ohio), and sold asbestos-containing products based on their thermal resistance, tensile strength, chemical resistance, electrical insulating properties, and low cost.

What the manufacturers knew: Industry researchers, physicians, and executives at major asbestos manufacturers knew by the 1930s and 1940s that asbestos fibers caused fatal lung diseases. They suppressed that information and did not warn workers. The continued sale and installation of asbestos-containing materials at facilities like the Middletown Works was a business decision, not an unavoidable consequence of the era. That fact drives asbestos litigation in Ohio today.

Pre-1940s Through 1950s: Construction and Heavy Installation

During original construction and major expansion phases, asbestos-containing materials were reportedly installed throughout the plant as standard industrial practice. Thermal insulation for steam piping, boilers, and high-temperature process equipment was almost universally asbestos-based during this period.

Installing new asbestos-containing insulation releases far more fiber than leaving materials undisturbed. Construction workers — including members of insulators and ironworkers unions serving the Ohio region — who worked during this era may have been among the most heavily exposed.

1960s–1970s: Peak Asbestos Use Despite Known Dangers

The 1960s and 1970s were the highest-volume asbestos years in U.S. industry, even as scientific evidence of harm accumulated. Major manufacturers allegedly continued selling asbestos-containing products directly to integrated steel mills across Ohio:

  • — asbestos-containing insulation and gasket products
  • (Toledo, Ohio) — thermal insulation systems
  • — pipe covering and block insulation
  • — asbestos-containing materials
  • — insulation products
  • gaskets and packing — gasket materials
  • — valve and equipment components containing asbestos-containing materials

These manufacturers may have supplied insulation, gaskets, packing, refractory materials, and other asbestos-containing products to integrated steel mills including the Middletown Works. Workers in maintenance and construction trades — including members of Asbestos Workers Local 3 (Cleveland) and Boilermakers Local 900 — were routinely cutting, fitting, and removing asbestos-containing insulation during major maintenance and capital improvement projects throughout this period. Similar exposure patterns have been documented at Republic Steel in Youngstown and Ford’s Lorain Assembly Plant, where Ohio union members worked with comparable asbestos-containing product lines during the same decades.

1978–1990: Regulatory Pressure and Gradual Transition

After EPA regulatory action and OSHA permissible exposure limits took effect, new asbestos-containing product installation declined. The transition was not clean:

  • Existing asbestos-containing materials remained installed in boilers, furnaces, and pipe systems
  • Maintenance and renovation work on aging asbestos-containing insulation continued to generate exposure
  • Workers who replaced gaskets, removed deteriorated pipe covering, or performed maintenance in affected areas faced ongoing risk through this period

1990s and Beyond: Legacy Materials and Renovation Exposure

Even after new asbestos-containing product installation largely stopped, legacy materials remained in older portions of the facility. Workers involved in renovation, demolition, or equipment replacement during the 1990s and 2000s may have been exposed to asbestos-containing materials installed 30 or 40 years earlier. Ohio EPA NESHAP abatement notifications have documented asbestos-containing materials in aging industrial facilities across Butler County and the broader Ohio manufacturing corridor during this period.

General Equipment at Cleveland-Cliffs Burns Harbor Middletown Ohio

The equipment below represents the systems and infrastructure documented or typically present at this facility during the era when asbestos-containing materials were specified in industrial construction. This is general facility-equipment reference — not a legal attribution of any specific product, manufacturer, or exposure event to this facility. Material-category and manufacturer information is addressed in the AsbestosIndex Product Crosswalk linked under the records table below.

Industrial Boilers View crosswalk › Process Piping View crosswalk › Pipe Insulation View crosswalk › Block Insulation View crosswalk › Valves View crosswalk › Gaskets View crosswalk › Pumps View crosswalk › Heat Exchangers View crosswalk › Cooling Equipment View crosswalk ›

Documented Asbestos Evidence — Ohio

The records below are verified, state-documented asbestos removals at this facility. Each entry represents a regulated abatement project where the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (Ohio EPA) was notified under federal NESHAP rules, the work was logged, and the asbestos-containing material was confirmed and removed under regulated conditions. These are not allegations or estimates — they are paper records tying documented asbestos-containing material to this specific site.

No Ohio EPA NESHAP abatement notifications have been identified for this facility in current public records. Per the framing above, absence of state-agency documentation should not be read as absence of asbestos — only as absence of a formal, regulated abatement event meeting reporting thresholds. Workers who recall encountering pipe insulation, block insulation, gaskets, or other asbestos-era construction materials at this facility may still have viable claims regardless of whether a state record exists.

Material Categories in Documented Records

The materials documented above (and similar asbestos-containing materials commonly encountered in records of this type) appear in the AsbestosIndex catalog with historical manufacturer and trust-fund information. Click a category to view manufacturers historically associated with that material:

Thermal System Insulation View crosswalk › Asbestos-Cement Board View crosswalk › Pipe Insulation View crosswalk › Roofing & Flashing View crosswalk › Spray Fireproofing View crosswalk › Floor Tile & Mastic View crosswalk › Ceiling Tile View crosswalk › Gaskets & Packing View crosswalk ›

Ohio — Filing Deadline & Next Steps

Ohio law gives mesothelioma and asbestos-disease claimants 2 years from the date of medical diagnosis to file a personal-injury lawsuit (ORC § 2305.10). For wrongful-death claims after an asbestos-related death, the filing window is 2 years from the date of death (ORC § 2125.02). The two deadlines run on separate tracks — preserving one does not extend the other.

The personal-injury clock runs from diagnosis, not from exposure. Mesothelioma latency is typically 20 to 50 years, so workers exposed in the 1950s–1980s are being diagnosed today.

Practical first steps

  1. Document what you remember. Pay stubs, W-2s, union cards, photographs, coworker names, and dates of employment. The WorkChain widget on this page can save a copy you can email yourself.
  2. Preserve medical records. Pathology reports, biopsy results, imaging, and pulmonary-function tests are central to both civil claims and trust-fund filings.
  3. Identify household members. Spouses who laundered work clothing and children of plant workers are eligible for secondary-exposure claims when diagnosed with an asbestos-related disease.
  4. Speak with an asbestos attorney with Ohio experience. The first conversation is free and confidential. Asbestos trust-fund claims and civil claims run on different tracks — both can be pursued in parallel.

Asbestos-Related Diseases — Ohio

Asbestos fiber exposure can cause several specific diseases that typically appear decades after the original exposure. The latency period — the gap between exposure and diagnosis — usually runs 20 to 50 years. That's why workers exposed in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s are receiving diagnoses today.

Mesothelioma

A rare, aggressive cancer that affects the lining of the lungs (pleural mesothelioma), abdomen (peritoneal), or heart (pericardial). Mesothelioma is almost exclusively caused by asbestos exposure, which is why a mesothelioma diagnosis often points directly to historical workplace exposure. Average latency from first exposure to diagnosis is 30-50 years.

Asbestosis

A chronic, non-cancerous scarring of lung tissue caused by inhaled asbestos fibers. Asbestosis causes progressive shortness of breath, persistent cough, and reduced lung function. It does not improve with treatment, and it is a recognized basis for compensation under most trust schedules and civil claims.

Lung Cancer

Asbestos exposure significantly increases the risk of lung cancer, particularly when combined with a history of smoking. Asbestos-related lung cancer is compensable under the same trust schedules and civil claim avenues as mesothelioma.

Other Recognized Diseases

Pleural plaques, pleural thickening, laryngeal cancer, ovarian cancer, and certain gastrointestinal cancers are also recognized as asbestos-related under various trust schedules and case-law authorities, though eligibility and proof requirements vary by claim type.

If you have any of these diagnoses and you worked at this facility, lived with someone who did, or were exposed in any documented capacity, you may have a claim worth pursuing. Speak with an attorney before assuming you don't qualify.

Data Sources — Ohio

Information about facility equipment, industrial materials, and occupational records referenced on this page is drawn from publicly available sources where applicable, including:

If specific equipment or product claims in this article are sourced from a non-public database, the source is identified parenthetically within the text above.