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It was not the worst for fatalities, but the one that disturbs me most I think, was the one in the 1980s in Ukraine where an intense radiation source that was l
by retrac 2y ago
It was not the worst for fatalities, but the one that disturbs me most I think, was the one in the 1980s in Ukraine where an intense radiation source that was lost, worked its way into gravel, that was used for concrete for an apartment building. It was in a panel in a bedroom. A young family died of leukemia. Another family moved in. The son of the man who moved in, soon died of leukemia. He knew about the previous residents, and started looking into it, and eventually they brought in a radiation specialist and a geiger counter.
The dose rate was about 0.2 R per hour. Enough to almost certainly be fatal if you slept next to it regularly for even just a few months. Yet low enough that it likely wouldn't cause any acute sickness to anyone simply passing through the room periodically. Particularly insidious. And so it was in the wall for 9 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kramatorsk_radiological_accident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kramatorsk_radiological_accide...
- tshaddox 2y agoThe disturbing thing about the Juarez contamination is that one old radiotherapy machine was able to meaningfully contaminate 6,000 tons of rebar.
- mschuster91 2y agoYeah, and that's why scrap yards in Germany are required by our OSHA equivalent [1] to scan all incoming and outgoing scrap for radiation and that all workers be regularly trained on how to properly deal with contamination. In 2009, these checks led to the discovery of at least 150 tons of contaminated metal across the country, the source here were Indian steel plants who melted down cobalt-60 sources together with regular scrap [2]. [1] https://www.bghm.de/fileadmin/user_upload/Arbeitsschuetzer/Gesetze_Vorschriften/Informationen/209-029.pdf https://www.bghm.de/fileadmin/user_upload/Arbeitsschuetzer/G... [2] https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/giftmuell-import-strahlenschrott-wurde-ueber-ganz-deutschland-verteilt-a-607937.html https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/giftmuell-import-...