"Chad went through increasing levels of radiation training, including an eight-hour course that teaches lab employees what ionizing radiation is, how it penetra

"Chad went through increasing levels of radiation training, including an eight-hour course that teaches lab employees what ionizing radiation is, how it penetrates bodies and how they can protect themselves. It is required for workers whose jobs routinely place them in areas with high radiation, contamination or airborne radioactivity." I used to work at a nuclear research facility in Germany. One of the side jobs available as a PhD student was to teach this type of training, designed to teach the layman about ionizing radiation and some basic safety rules. (For example the difference between external radiation doses and the potentially much more dangerous role that ingested radionuclides may play.) These trainings were, if I recall correctly, two days long. I remember being told that they were required for anyone who might enter any commercial nuclear power plant in a professional capacity, including any local contractors, firemen, you name it. My point is: the article positions this as some advanced course, when it really is the absolute basis, taught to everyone, geared to all out pragmatism. Knowing that, it makes me doubt some of the other suggestions and conclusions in the article, even though it's not hard to imagine that these sites at least had a history of playing fast and loose in the early days. By the way, the most important lesson from that training was: you can't see radiation, so instead of second guessing, calmly get as far away as possible (radiation on surface of a sphere goes with 1/r^2) and alert someone with more detailed understanding. "Shielding" likely doesn't quite do what you think, so prefer distance.