Asbestos found at high school in Philadelphia's West Oak Lane neighborhood

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- Remediation efforts are underway Thursday night inside a Philadelphia high school after an inspection this week revealed exposed asbestos.

The school was closed Thursday to students and staff and will be again on Friday.

Philadelphia parents are expressing concerns after learning yet another district school has been temporarily closed due to asbestos.

Building 21, a high school in West Oak Lane which was built in 1915, shut its doors Wednesday after the cancer-causing minerals were discovered exposed in the auditorium and stairwells during a routine check.

"I work at West Oak Lane Charter School, that's so terrifying. That's awful," said John Whelan of West Oak Lane.

According to the 6abc Data Journalism Team, since 2016, there have been 2,289 asbestos abatement projects across the School District of Philadelphia; 1,675 of those have occurred at schools with elementary-aged children.

So far this year, there have been 196 abatement projects at Philadelphia schools.

"It's reprehensible that so many of our buildings are over 100 years old and they have been neglected because of the lack of the appropriate money in the budget in order to maintain," said Jerry Jordan, president of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers.

Jordan is pushing for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to allocate more funding to schools to address these aging buildings which he says often have lead and asbestos.

"Ingesting just a particle of asbestos can lead to mesothelioma and unfortunately it does not identify itself in most cases for 20 or 30 years," said Jordan.

The district says it will conduct air quality tests after the remediation process is complete to make sure the school is safe for students and staff to return.

The Federation of Teachers says they'll also conduct their own testing.

Students from Building 21 will temporarily move to the Strawberry Mansion High School starting Monday, March 6, school officials said.